Fortune hunters flock to Madagascar sapphire mines

The dusty figure is lowered slowly into the ground like a bucket into a well, armed with just a crowbar, a shovel and an old, unreliable headlamp.

In the surrounding countryside, bodies rise and sink from hundreds of holes just wide enough for a man.

Children run between the rubble and the smell of cooking wafts from the makeshift shelters where women crouch over pots.