Gruff men shout over an angry motor as they float huge blocks of ice towards a rusty conveyor belt on the bank of a frozen river in northeast China.
Every winter, dozens of workers brave sub-zero temperatures to hack ice from the mighty Songhua River and deliver it around Harbin, the capital of Heilongjiang province.
It forms the building blocks for the massive sculptures that are the centrepiece of the city’s Ice and Snow World, an annual festival that draws tens of thousands of visitors.
But this year, a warmer autumn has delayed the freeze and left the river ice thinner than normal.
