Lake Assal, Djibouti – Yann Arthus-Bertrand Photography

The Republic of Djibouti is located in one of the world’s most unstable tectonic zones, at the juncture of two large fractures in the Earth’s crust, the East African rift and the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden rifts that separate the African peninsula. Telluric accidents are particularly intense because the plates are not on the same level. They overlap, rub and part, some going over 2.000m in altitude whilst the others where the salt Lake Assal is, reach the lowest point in Africa at 155 m below sea level. The depression of Lake Assal is a furnace and this accelerates evaporation. Once or twice a year, strong rains that only last for a few dozen hours supply water to the wadi which flows into the lake. They carry water full of detrital sediments (pebbles, sand and clay) and minerals which, under the effect of strong evaporation, crystallize on the basalt riverbed, thus leaving a trace of the passage of turbulent waters.