A worker rests after an exhausting day trying to put new heads on the wells. Workers toil in twelve-hour shifts. Kuwait, 1991.

"I went to Kuwait after the war against Iraq, when the oil wells were still burning and flowing out of control. There I lived the apocalypse and saw the black symbol of humanity.... For weeks, teams of specialists from different parts of the world fought the flames and spills. It was like fighting against the end of the world, a world drenched in black and death."

--Sebastião Salgado

More than five hundred oil wells spun roaring tornadoes of flame into the blackened sky. Experts called them "wild wells"--the best words to describe those uncontrolled gushings, some spilling crude oil, most sending roaring towers of flame sixty-five feet into the air. Kuwait, 1991.

Workers place a new wellhead in an oil well that had been damaged by Iraqi explosives. Greater Burhan Oil Field, Kuwait, 1991.

A fire fighter from the Safety Boss team knocked unconscious by a blast of gas from the wellhead. He was pulled clear by three co-workers. Greater Burhan Oil Field, Kuwait, 1991.