Word of the Week: Unwetter

It's not exactly what you'd expect from summer, but Germany often experiences some crazy thunderstorms in the mid-year months. Lightning bolts flash across the sky, thunder growls like a monster and rain bursts down without an end in sight.

The weather can be so bad in Germany during the that it has caused severe floods, drenching entire villages and disrupting transportation. When the is so crazy, you can't even call it weather anymore.

That's why in German you refer to severe storms like this as Unwetter, which literally means un-weather. The term is used for extreme weather conditions that differ significantly from what the weather would usually be like and which have the potential to cause damage.