Catastrophe
noun
A sudden event that causes a lot of damage or a lot of suffering.
The earthquake was a major catastrophe that killed thousands of people.
Often appears as...
- natural catastrophe
- humanitarian catastrophe
noun
A failure or unpleasant occurrence.
His business venture ended in catastrophe.
Often appears as...
- financial catastrophe
- business catastrophe
noun
The final event of the dramatic action, especially of a tragedy.
In the final catastrophe of the play, everyone dies.
Often appears as...
- dramatic catastrophe
- tragic catastrophe
Usage tips
Formal
Literary
noun
A sudden event that causes a lot of damage or a lot of suffering.
The earthquake was a major catastrophe that killed thousands of people.
Often appears as...
- natural catastrophe
- humanitarian catastrophe
noun
A failure or unpleasant occurrence.
His business venture ended in catastrophe.
Often appears as...
- financial catastrophe
- business catastrophe
noun
The final event of the dramatic action, especially of a tragedy.
In the final catastrophe of the play, everyone dies.
Often appears as...
- dramatic catastrophe
- tragic catastrophe
Usage tips
Formal
Literary
Definition 1 of 3
Pro Tip 1/3Sudden and Severe
Use 'catastrophe' to describe events with immediate, widespread impact.
After the dam burst, the resulting flood was a catastrophe.
Pro Tip 2/3Human Suffering
Highlighting significant loss, physical suffering, or fatalities.
The famine led to a human catastrophe, affecting millions.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Personal
Refers usually to large-scale events, not personal misfortune.
Losing your phone is not a catastrophe; it's an inconvenience.
Pro Tip 1/3Sudden and Severe
Use 'catastrophe' to describe events with immediate, widespread impact.
After the dam burst, the resulting flood was a catastrophe.
Pro Tip 2/3Human Suffering
Highlighting significant loss, physical suffering, or fatalities.
The famine led to a human catastrophe, affecting millions.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Personal
Refers usually to large-scale events, not personal misfortune.
Losing your phone is not a catastrophe; it's an inconvenience.
Pro Tip 1/3Sudden and Severe
Use 'catastrophe' to describe events with immediate, widespread impact.
After the dam burst, the resulting flood was a catastrophe.
Pro Tip 2/3Human Suffering
Highlighting significant loss, physical suffering, or fatalities.
The famine led to a human catastrophe, affecting millions.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Personal
Refers usually to large-scale events, not personal misfortune.
Losing your phone is not a catastrophe; it's an inconvenience.
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Video examples
Chimamanda Ngozi...
But there are other stories that are not about catastrophe, and it is very important, it is just as important, to talk about them. I've always felt that it is impossible to engage properly with a place or a person without engaging with all of the stories of that place and that person.
Video examples
Carl Safina: The oil...
you can't touch, you can't extract and, I think most importantly -- this is what I think -- you can't see it. I think it's being hidden on purpose. Now this is such a catastrophe and such a mess that lots of stuff is leaking out on the edges of the information stream.
Video examples
A Big Cat Wild Kill & a...
survive in this terrain filming is cut short by a catastrophe one that shows how precarious all life is in these mountains I was actually starting to enjoy being here with the crew and and seeing the leopard hogs on had one of its largest earthquakes ever in the
Video examples
Newton’s three-body...
Thankfully, continuous advancements in computer simulations offer a number of ways to avoid catastrophe. By approximating the solutions with increasingly powerful processors, we can more confidently predict the motion of n-body systems on long time-scales.
Video examples
Nationalism vs....
and they say that we can't do it before the catastrophe, but we need to start laying the foundations so that when the disaster strikes, we can react quickly. But people will just not have the motivation to do such a thing before the disaster strikes.
Video examples
Four reasons you should...
your private life or business life compared to not knowing it be truthful most people have a difficult time coming up with a single example now people push me and they say but you have to know if there's a catastrophe somewhere on the
Video examples
Carsten Peter: Inside...
could suffocate of carbon dioxide. A limnic catastrophe of the lake would be really unimaginable. It happens every thousand years, every millennium, that all life is extinct around that lake. But the surrounding of the volcano
Video examples
Do we really need...
Nowadays, we avoid such agricultural catastrophes with the help of pesticides. Those are a range of manmade chemicals that control insects, unwanted weeds, funguses, rodents, and bacteria that may threaten our food supply.
Video examples
12 truths I learned from...
was the catastrophe of my behavior and thinking. So I asked some sober friends for help, and I turned to a higher power. One acronym for God is the "gift of desperation," G-O-D, or as a sober friend put it,
Video examples
The future of...
Humanity now is in a race between catastrophe and consciousness. The psychedelic renaissance is here to help consciousness triumph. And now, if you all just look under your seats Just joking!
Video examples
Chimamanda Ngozi...
But there are other stories that are not about catastrophe, and it is very important, it is just as important, to talk about them. I've always felt that it is impossible to engage properly with a place or a person without engaging with all of the stories of that place and that person.
Video examples
Carl Safina: The oil...
you can't touch, you can't extract and, I think most importantly -- this is what I think -- you can't see it. I think it's being hidden on purpose. Now this is such a catastrophe and such a mess that lots of stuff is leaking out on the edges of the information stream.
Video examples
A Big Cat Wild Kill & a...
survive in this terrain filming is cut short by a catastrophe one that shows how precarious all life is in these mountains I was actually starting to enjoy being here with the crew and and seeing the leopard hogs on had one of its largest earthquakes ever in the
Video examples
Newton’s three-body...
Thankfully, continuous advancements in computer simulations offer a number of ways to avoid catastrophe. By approximating the solutions with increasingly powerful processors, we can more confidently predict the motion of n-body systems on long time-scales.
Video examples
Nationalism vs....
and they say that we can't do it before the catastrophe, but we need to start laying the foundations so that when the disaster strikes, we can react quickly. But people will just not have the motivation to do such a thing before the disaster strikes.
Video examples
Four reasons you should...
your private life or business life compared to not knowing it be truthful most people have a difficult time coming up with a single example now people push me and they say but you have to know if there's a catastrophe somewhere on the
Video examples
Carsten Peter: Inside...
could suffocate of carbon dioxide. A limnic catastrophe of the lake would be really unimaginable. It happens every thousand years, every millennium, that all life is extinct around that lake. But the surrounding of the volcano
Video examples
Do we really need...
Nowadays, we avoid such agricultural catastrophes with the help of pesticides. Those are a range of manmade chemicals that control insects, unwanted weeds, funguses, rodents, and bacteria that may threaten our food supply.
Video examples
12 truths I learned from...
was the catastrophe of my behavior and thinking. So I asked some sober friends for help, and I turned to a higher power. One acronym for God is the "gift of desperation," G-O-D, or as a sober friend put it,
Video examples
The future of...
Humanity now is in a race between catastrophe and consciousness. The psychedelic renaissance is here to help consciousness triumph. And now, if you all just look under your seats Just joking!
Example 1 of 10
Quote examples
Frei Otto
German Architect
We have big, big problems - flooding, earthquake, and many foolish things which now people are doing - I mean, these self-made catastrophes. We are able to give to every man on the street the possibilities to help himself. And to fight for this was one of my duties.
Quote examples
Francois Hollande
French Statesman
I can't separate the fight with terrorism and the fight against global warming. These are two big global challenges we have to face up to because we have to leave our children more than a world free of terror; we also owe them a planet protected from catastrophes.
Quote examples
Haile Selassie
Ethiopian Statesman
We all wish to live. We all seek a world in which men are freed of the burdens of ignorance, poverty, hunger and disease. And we shall all be hard-pressed to escape the deadly rain of nuclear fall-out should catastrophe overtake us.
Quote examples
Andrew Coyle Bradley
American Judge
Shakespeare very rarely makes the least attempt to surprise by his catastrophes. They are felt to be inevitable, though the precise way in which they will be brought about is not, of course, foreseen.
Quote examples
Parker Palmer
American Educator
Proposing inner-life solutions to our political and economic catastrophes is something done, say the critics, only by people who've spent more time in la-la land than in the 'real world.
Quote examples
Richard Bausch
American Novelist
In every circumstance, all my life, my mind shows me the possible bad outcome: someone walks down steps, and before I can do anything to head the image off, I see a fall, a catastrophe.
Quote examples
Susan Sontag
American Author
AIDS occupies such a large part in our awareness because of what it has been taken to represent. It seems the very model of all the catastrophes privileged populations feel await them.
Quote examples
Kristin Scott Thomas
English Actress
I'm not one of those famous people flying round the world emoting over every catastrophe. I'm too feeble.
Quote examples
Adrien Brody
American Actor
I think there's a lot of catastrophe in this world and a lot of cruelty and a lot of carelessness.
Quote examples
Michael J. Fox
Canadian Actor
Life delivered me a catastrophe, but I found a richness of soul.
Quote examples
Frei Otto
German Architect
We have big, big problems - flooding, earthquake, and many foolish things which now people are doing - I mean, these self-made catastrophes. We are able to give to every man on the street the possibilities to help himself. And to fight for this was one of my duties.
Quote examples
Francois Hollande
French Statesman
I can't separate the fight with terrorism and the fight against global warming. These are two big global challenges we have to face up to because we have to leave our children more than a world free of terror; we also owe them a planet protected from catastrophes.
Quote examples
Haile Selassie
Ethiopian Statesman
We all wish to live. We all seek a world in which men are freed of the burdens of ignorance, poverty, hunger and disease. And we shall all be hard-pressed to escape the deadly rain of nuclear fall-out should catastrophe overtake us.
Quote examples
Andrew Coyle Bradley
American Judge
Shakespeare very rarely makes the least attempt to surprise by his catastrophes. They are felt to be inevitable, though the precise way in which they will be brought about is not, of course, foreseen.
Quote examples
Parker Palmer
American Educator
Proposing inner-life solutions to our political and economic catastrophes is something done, say the critics, only by people who've spent more time in la-la land than in the 'real world.
Quote examples
Richard Bausch
American Novelist
In every circumstance, all my life, my mind shows me the possible bad outcome: someone walks down steps, and before I can do anything to head the image off, I see a fall, a catastrophe.
Quote examples
Susan Sontag
American Author
AIDS occupies such a large part in our awareness because of what it has been taken to represent. It seems the very model of all the catastrophes privileged populations feel await them.
Quote examples
Kristin Scott Thomas
English Actress
I'm not one of those famous people flying round the world emoting over every catastrophe. I'm too feeble.
Quote examples
Adrien Brody
American Actor
I think there's a lot of catastrophe in this world and a lot of cruelty and a lot of carelessness.
Quote examples
Michael J. Fox
Canadian Actor
Life delivered me a catastrophe, but I found a richness of soul.
Example 1 of 10
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