adj.
fraught with extreme danger; nearly hopeless; "a desperate illness"; "on all fronts the Allies were in a desperate situation due to lack of materiel"- G.C.Marshall; "a dire emergency"
adj.
intensely or extremely bad or unpleasant in degree or quality; "severe pain"; "a severe case of flu"; "a terrible cough"; "under wicked fire from the enemy's guns"; "a wicked cough"
adj.
too closely correlated to be attributed to chance and therefore indicating a systematic relation; "the interaction effect is significant at the .01 level"; "no significant difference was found"