Heavy rain and hail caused a surprise snowfall in Saudi Arabia’s Al-Jawf region, turning the area into an icy landscape for the first time. In sharp contrast to the region’s typical desert landscape, the normally parched mountains were covered in snow after the rain that began last Wednesday and evolved into hailstorms.

Saudi Arabian desert covered in snowThis is the first time in history that the desert has been covered in snow, as temperatures there rarely drop to such levels. A severe hail storm also raged there recently.