English Vocabulary in Use Upper-intermediate » Unit 6: The weather

Word List
  • boiling
  • breeze
  • damp
  • daytime
  • downpour
  • expect
  • foggy
  • freeze
  • frost
  • gale
  • gentle
  • heatwave
  • high
  • humid
  • melt
  • misty
  • muggy
  • overcast
  • pour down
  • stifling
  • thaw
  • torrential rain
  • tropical
  • drought
  • flood
  • heavy
  • hurricane
  • late
  • rain
  • severe
  • shower
  • strong
  • wind
Exercises

6.1 ‣ Answer the questions about the words in A opposite.

  1. Which adjective could you use to describe something that is wet, but not very wet?
  2. Which adjective would you use before 'summer' to refer to the end part of it? _____
  3. Which verb means the temperature has gone up and there is no longer frost or ice? _____
  4. Which word can be used to describe something that happens in the day? _____
  5. What happens to ice cream on a very hot day? _____
  6. If you see a thin, white covering on everything on a cold day, what is it? _____
  7. If you can't see things in the distance, what is the weather probably like? _____
  8. Which two adjectives could you use to describe a wind that blows very hard? _____
  9. Which adjective can you use to describe very bad weather? _____

6.2 ‣ What types of weather do these pictures suggest?

  2. _____
  3. _____
  4. _____

6.3 ‣ Rewrite the words in bold using words from B opposite.

I think it would be interesting to live in a hot climate. However, I don't like weather that is hot and damp and makes you sweat _____. I even dislike the days that are slightly warm and damp _____ which we get in the UK. Some people love extremely _____ hot days, and I don't mind very hot, dry periods _____ occasionally, but when it's hot and uncomfortable and you can hardly breathe _____, it's just impossible. Maybe I should stay at home and forget about moving to a hot climate!

6.4 ‣ What kinds of weather do you think caused the following to happen? Write a sentence which could go before each of these. Use words from the opposite page.

  1.  We had to use the air-conditioning every afternoon.
  2. _____ The sweat was pouring out of us.
  3. _____ It just cooled us nicely on the hot beach.
  4. _____ Cars were sliding everywhere out of control.
  5. _____ The postman had to use a boat to get around.
  6. _____ You couldn't really see the trees in the distance.
  7. _____ The earth became rock hard and a lot of plants died.
  8. _____ It blew the newspaper right out of my hands.
  9. _____ My hair and clothes got soaking wet.
  10. _____ It looked as if it would rain at any minute.

6.5 ‣

Over to you

This chart shows anyone who wants to visit the West of Ireland what weather they can expect at different times of the year. Make a similar chart for your country or home region.

Dec–MarApril–JuneJuly–AugSept–Nov
coldest months; usually wet; heavy rain; snow on high ground Aprilgenerally cool, often wet and windy but getting warmerwarmest months; sunny, with showers; cool sea breezesoften mild, becoming cold; damp, misty and foggy, often overcast
Answer Key
A ‣ Cold weather

In Northern Europe, daytime1 temperatures are often quite mild, even in late2 autumn. The days are often misty3, foggy and damp4. Soon, winter arrives, with frost5, icy roads and severe6 weather, including heavy snow. As people expect the weather to be bad, they try and keep warm so they don't freeze! Freezing weather may continue in the far north until May or even June, when the ground starts to thaw /θɔː/7 and the ice melts8 again.

1 during the day
2 towards the end of a period of time
3 with clouds of small drops of water in the air, making it difficult to see things in the distance
4 slightly wet, and not pleasant or comfortable
5 thin, white layer of ice on surfaces when the weather is very cold
6 extremely bad
7 change from hard, frozen state to softer state
8 change from solid to liquid under heat

B ‣ Warm/hot weather

In a tropical1 climate, the weather is often stifling2, muggy3 and humid4. In other hot climates, there may be boiling5 hot days, and heatwaves6 may be common.

1 very hot, as in countries near the Equator
2 hot, uncomfortable, you can hardly breathe
3 very warm and a little damp
4 hot and damp, makes you sweat a lot
5 extremely hot
6 very hot, dry period

C ‣ Wet weather


  1. shower

  2. heavy rain

  3. pour down

  4. torrential rain

  5. flood

This wet weather scale gets stronger from left to right.
shower (noun) → heavy rain → pour down (verb) / downpour (noun) → torrential rain → flood (noun and verb)

This rain won't last long; it's only a shower. [short period of rain]

There was quite heavy rain during the night. / It rained heavily during the night.

It was absolutely pouring down yesterday. / There was a real downpour.

In Malaysia there is usually torrential rain most days, and the roads sometimes get flooded. / There are sometimes floods on the roads.

The sky's a bit overcast; I think it's going to rain. [very cloudy]

We had a drought /draʊt/ last summer. It didn't rain for six weeks.

D ‣ Wind

There was a gentle breeze on the beach, just enough to cool us.
There was a very strong/high wind and my umbrella blew away.
There was a gale that day, so we didn't go sailing. [very high wind]
People stayed indoors because there was a hurricane on the way. [extremely high, dangerous wind]

Common mistakes

The noun weather is uncountable. We say: We had bad weather that day. (NOT We had a bad weather.)

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