"For 2025, Nat Geo compiled 25 extraordinary pictures from the past year, which Editor in Chief Nathan Lump writes, "encode a sense of urgency, a call to preserve what's in danger of being lost, as well as a reminder of the poetic beauty to be found in carrying on, in daring to dream of a better future." The photos are diverse in their storytelling, including intimate wildlife portraits, sweeping landscapes, groundbreaking scientific discoveries and intimate human narratives."
"A sperm whale floats amid shards of polar pack ice, dead and decomposing, mouth hanging open. When photographer Roie Galitz captured the scene with a drone, the image was so arresting that it took a moment to notice the hungry female polar bear stretching her jaw to break through the whale's leathery skin. Galitz was leading a photography expedition along Norway's Svalbard archipelago when he spotted a blackened blob floating on the horizon. As the icebreaker drew close, he could see (and smell) that the blob was a massive decaying carcass releasing an occasional exhalation of noxious gas, "like a big air cushion.""
A curated set of twenty-five striking images conveys urgency, the need to preserve at-risk places and species, and the resilient beauty in imagining a better future. The photographs span intimate wildlife portraits, vast landscapes, scientific breakthroughs, and human stories, illustrating varied forms of change and continuity. One image shows a decomposing sperm whale amid polar pack ice with a female polar bear attempting to tear through its thick hide, signaling shifting animal ranges as Arctic waters warm. Another scene captures animals converging on a meager water hole during extreme drought in Botswana's Okavango Delta, highlighting climate stress on ecosystems.
Read at ABC7 Los Angeles
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