To many people, Saudi Arabia is a land of dry deserts where the sun shines bright and where the rain rarely falls.
Just recently, however, parts of Saudi Arabia experienced unusual hailstorms, thunderstorms and heavy rains, which turned deserts white and caused floods that have so far claimed the lives of 19 people.
A terrifying footage of the hailstorm, posted on the website of The Mirror, showed hailstones the size of golf balls raining heavily down at an alarming speed on the desert. The video clip has already been seen 50,000 times.
When the hailstones melted, the dry desert turned into a raging river of ice water. The amount of rain and hail that poured over Saudi Arabia in the past two days was estimated to be eight years' worth of precipitation.
Some residents also took to social media to post photos of the flooding, which turned a dry valley in a virtual body of water.
Others on social media, including Christian evangelicals, meanwhile expressed fears that the odd hailstorm and flooding in Saudi Arabia could be another sign that the end of the world is near.
"There was an ice storm in the desert. This surely is a sign that 'Hell freezes over'," one of the social media posters commented, as quoted by The Express.
Climate scientist Dr Abd al-Aziz al-Rubaie, however, explained that the hailstorm and heavy rains were caused by the seasonal low pressure area.
Unprecedented downpours were also experienced in the Middle Eastern nations of Iraq and Iran in the past days, with 50 people needing to be rescued by the government due to flooding. The flashfloods have also affected Syrian refugees in these areas.
Al-Rubaie also predicted that the precipitation may become even heavier in the coming days, especially in Yemen and Oman, due to Tropical Cyclone Chapla.
