Photos: National Geographic Travel Photographer of the Year – The Winners

[Yahoo News}- Exploding volcanoes, sprawling urban landscapes and eerie underwater scenes are among the staggeringly beautiful moments captured by the winners of the 2017 National Geographic Travel photographer of the year competition.

A once-in-a-lifetime moment provided the subject for the winning image, taken by photographer Sergio Tapiro Velasco.

As he stood just 12 kilometres away from the molten summit of Mexico’s Volcán de Colima volcano, a bolt of lightning snapped from the sky onto the crater.

When he realised what he had managed to capture, Sergio was shocked.

‘When I looked on the camera display, all I could do was stare,’ he said.

‘What I was watching was impossible to conceive, the image showed those amazing forces of nature interacting on a volcano, while the lightning brightened the whole scene.

‘It’s an impossible photograph and my once in a lifetime shot that shows the power of nature.’

His picture was crowned the winner out of more than 15,000 entries submitted by photographers hailing from 30 countries.

This year’s competition was judged by Molly Roberts, senior photography editor at National Geographic; Benjamin Lowy, award-winning adventure and underwater photographer; and Jody MacDonald, award-winning adventure sport and documentary photographer.

Molly said: ‘The quality of submissions in the 2017 Travel Photographer of the Year contest was wonderfully eclectic.

‘I was inspired by the variety of locations and creativity of the photographers in their quest to make compelling images.’

Fireflies light up a forest in Japan with their pinpricks of light (Yutaka Takafuji/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

Caribbean reef sharks bump up against the camera as it takes photos using a remote trigger. (Shane Gross/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

A lightning strike hits the exploding crater of the Colima volcano in Mexico as smoke pours from the crater. (Sergio Tapiro Velasco/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

Pro surfer Donovan Frankenreiter plunges beneath the waves in Fiki. (Rodney Bursei/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

A father and son share a tender moment in front of a bright blue sky in New Delhi. (Michael Dean Morgan/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

The marbled walls of caves in Patagonia are reflected in water (Clane Gessel/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

An aerial shot captures the unusual set-up of the Henningsvær football pitch in the Lofoten Islands (Misha De-Stroyev/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

New buildings spring up from the desert in the United Arab Emirates. (Andrzej Bochenski/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

The Mount Bromo volcano in Indonesia belches thick, orange smoke into the sky. (Reynold Riksa Dewantara/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

Giant crocodiles lounge on the muddy banks of a river in Costa Rica, while yet more cool off in teh shallows. (Tarun Sinna/National Geographic travel photographer of the year)

Click here to see some of the submissions for the Cities Category.