casualty
Americannoun
plural
casualties-
Military.
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a member of the armed forces lost to service through death, wounds, sickness, capture, or because their whereabouts or condition cannot be determined.
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casualties, loss in numerical strength through any cause, as death, wounds, sickness, capture, or desertion.
-
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one who is injured or killed in an accident.
There were no casualties in the traffic accident.
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any person, group, thing, etc., that is harmed or destroyed as a result of some act or event.
Their house was a casualty of the fire.
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a serious accident, especially one involving bodily injury or death.
noun
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a serviceman who is killed, wounded, captured, or missing as a result of enemy action
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a person who is injured or killed in an accident
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a hospital department in which victims of accidents, violence, etc, are treated
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anything that is lost, damaged, or destroyed as the result of an accident, etc
Etymology
Origin of casualty
First recorded in 1375–1425; casual + -ty 2; replacing late Middle English casuelte, equivalent to casuel ( casual ) + -te -ty 2
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Residents and advocates gathered Saturday to demand the ban of a chemical that’s used at a Torrance oil refinery and that they say has the potential to cause a mass casualty disaster.
From Los Angeles Times
The casualty toll was "expected to rise further", he said.
From Barron's
Authorities have not announced any casualties, and the national weather service forecast heavy rains and strong winds to continue on Thursday and Friday across the north.
From Barron's
The inquiry chair Sir Ross Cranston pointed to a "significant, systemic failure on the part of government", and said that several of the casualties were preventable.
From BBC
Its monitoring mission in Ukraine is the "only organisation" with a comprehensive record of verified civilian casualties "since the initial Russian invasion in 2014", he said.
From Barron's
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
