English Vocabulary in Use: Advanced Book with Answers and Enhanced eBook Vocabulary Reference and Practice 3rd Edition

soundlessly into the night sky. 
Was it an alien spacecraft?
Verbs for describing specific noises
The door 
slammed in the strong wind. 
[closed with a loud bang]
My bike wheel is 
squeaking. I need to get some oil. 
[high, irritating noise]
We could hear our neighbours’ favourite rock music 
pounding through the walls. 
[dull, beating sound]
The old wooden door 
creaked as I opened it. 
[noise of friction of wood and/or metal]
The sausages 
sizzled in the frying pan and smelt delicious. 
[sound made by frying]
A shot 
rang out and the bird fell from the sky. 
[typically used for the sound of a gunshot]
From our cottage, we could hear the waves 
crashing on the beach below. 
[loud, heavy noise, 
typically used for waves]
He always 
hoots/toots his horn to let us know he’s arrived. 
[sound made by a car horn]
I could hear police car sirens 
wailing all last night. 
[making a rising and falling sound]
She 
hammered at the door but nobody answered. 
[knocked very loudly and repeatedly]
Some adjectives for noise and silence
There was an 
eerie silence in the old church. 
[rather scary]
The noise of the aircraft engines was 
deafening. 
[extremely and painfully loud]
He has one of those 
grating voices that gets on my nerves. 
[unpleasant, irritating]
She let out a 
piercing scream and fled as fast as she could. 
[high noise that hurts the ears]
Zara has a very 
high-pitched voice; it can be a bit irritating at times. 
[higher than most voices, 
like a whistle]
The recording was very faint, almost 
inaudible. 
[impossible to hear]