- Photographer Massimo Rumi travelled to Ethiopia to take these extraordinary images
- The Danakil Depression in northern Ethiopia has the highest year-round temperatures in the world
- People have mined salt in the area for centuries, traditionally carting away tiles of salt by camel
- The landscape, pockmarked with active volcanoes and sulphur springs, is strangely beautiful
If you think your job is tough spare a thought for the men who dig for salt in one of the hottest places on Earth, the so-called 'Gateway to Hell'.
The Danakil Depression in northern Ethiopia has been mined for centuries for its salt but it is an unforgiving place to work.
Temperatures during the day rarely drop below 50 degrees Celsius and frequently hit 60 degrees.
So the workers choose to start work before dawn in order to avoid the worst of the midday heat.
The Danakil Depression is up to 300 feet below sea level and acts as a giant cauldron with the heat being intensified by active volcanoes which pockmark the landscape.
Massimo Rumi, an Italian photographer based in Australia, travelled to the area to take these extraordinary images.
The working day starts early in the Danakil Depression, a landscape pitted with active volcanoes and springs which pump out plumes of foul-smelling sulphur
The village of Hamad Ale (pictured) is home to the salt miners, who trade their salt in return for the food, water and other goods they need to survive in this inhospitable environment
The sulphur and salt have created over the centuries a fantastical landscape, which some visitors have compared to the Moon
It is a landscape you would not want to cross in the darkness, because a mis-step can drop the unwary visitor into a crevice or a vat of lava or steaming sulphur
He chronicled the workers, who are from the Afar tribe, as they toiled to cut slabs of salt, known as tiles, out of the earth and load it onto their camels.
Rumi said: 'The salt miners work under very tough conditions, in which temperatures hardly drop below 50-60 degrees celsius, even early in the morning.
'Their working hours are early, before the sun gets too hot and makes the work impossible.'
It would be hard work even in a mild climate. The miners hack away at the salt crust of the depression, breaking it into slabs, which can then be lifted out and loaded onto their camels
There are no pneumatic drills or heavy equipment for the miners, who use fairly rudimentary implements to break plates of salt out of the ground. Many of them have spent their whole lives mining salt
The salt is chopped into slabs, which need to be a certain size and weight. Most of the salt is destined for Ethiopian and Sudanese farmers, who use them as what are known as mineral licks. In this way animals are provided with essential nutrients
Some of the workers wear gloves to protect their hands while others prefer to work with their bare hands
The salt is cut into tiles, which are then tied up and lifted onto the camels. On a good day they can produce 200 of these tiles, which can sell for around four birr (13p) each
The landscape is very photogenic but is known as the 'Gateway to Hell' because of the heat and the overpowering smell of sulphur
The landscape they work in is hauntingly beautiful, with active volcanoes, sulphur-spewing springs, solidified black lava flows and huge and multi-coloured salt basins.
Rumi said: 'Visiting this place feels like being on the Moon. It is so surreal. It's a place of genuine, raw adventure.'
Centuries ago the salt tiles were used as currency. Nowadays they are sold across Ethiopia, often to farmers who want to provide their livestock with essential minerals.
Rumi said: 'As soon as I got out of the car I realised why this place is called the 'Gateway to Hell'. It is one of the hottest places on earth and I could feel the heat on my skin.
The camels are loaded up with the 'white gold' and led up out of the depression and to the town of Berhale, which is three days' walk
Camels, which famously store water in their humps, can walk for days without needing to drink and are the ideal means of transportation
But the camels can be stubborn creatures and their guides have to be skilled at animal husbandry
Sometimes donkeys are used to transport the salt tiles. But they cannot carry as much as camels or endure the heat as well
The village of Hamad Ale has only recently had a proper road and it is a six hour drive to the city of Mekele and another 13 hours to the capital, Addis Ababa
'Still for centuries the Afar people return to this extremely harsh and inhospitable place to carry out an important job.
'I came here to meet the hard-working salt diggers, who spend a good part of the day in this cruel environment cutting and shaping the salt into books and loading the camels.'
The miners use axes to chop the salt crust into large slabs of 'white gold' and place sticks into grooves which they have hacked out.
Rumi said: 'Working with the sticks, the workers lift the big slab of salt which is cut into tiles of standard sizes.
'They earn around four birr (13p) for each salt tile they cut, and on a good day they can make up to 200 tiles.'
The Danakil Depression is in a remote part of Ethiopia close to the border with Eritrea, which became independent in 1993
The Danakil Depression is not far from the border with Eritrea, and Ethiopian troops have been on high alert ever since a border war between the two countries which lasted from 1998 to 2000
The vivid colours of the Danakil Depression contrast with the bare mountains which surround it. It is up to 300 feet below sea level and this acts as a natural cauldron, keeping the heat in
The sun is not the only source of heat. The temperature is complemented by the active volcanoes in the area
Across the border in Djibouti is Lake Assal, a body of salt water which is nowadays just a salt plain. It is around 490 feet below sea level
Salt is also extracted from Lake Assal, which may one day dry up completely like the Danakil Depression
He said: 'The workers may look skinny but they're very strong. It looks like one of the worst jobs on earth but these people stay very humble and proud of their work.'
But digging out the salt is only half the story. It is then loaded onto camels, who are led for three days to the town of Berhale, where the salt is traded to farmers in the Ethiopian highlands and in neighbouring Sudan.
Rumi said: 'Because of safety issues this place does not see many visitors in the year.'
The Danakil Depression has frequently been compared to the surface of the Moon and there are certainly similarities with the lunar landscape
Italian photographer Massimo Rumi took these amazing images. In this picture a caravan of camels are silhouetted against the horizon as they head off towards Berhale with their cargo of salt
The camels spend much of their time lolling around waiting for the salt to be cut. But after a good rest they have to walk for three days
The salt miners and camel trekkers are from the Afar tribe. There are around three millions Afars in Ethiopia, with smaller numbers in neighbouring Djibouti and Eritrea
Camels, sometimes referred to as the 'ships of the desert', have been living and working in the Horn of Africa for millennia
As the sun goes down, mercifully reducing the temperature, a camel herder leads off one of the noble beasts of burden
Source: dailymail.co.uk
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