debacle
Americannoun
-
a general breakup or dispersion; sudden downfall or rout.
The revolution ended in a debacle.
-
a complete collapse or failure.
- Synonyms:
- calamity, catastrophe, fiasco, ruin, disaster
-
a breaking up of ice in a river.
-
a violent rush of waters or ice.
noun
-
a sudden disastrous collapse or defeat, esp one involving a disorderly retreat; rout
-
the breaking up of ice in a river during spring or summer, often causing flooding
-
a violent rush of water carrying along debris
Etymology
Origin of debacle
1795–1805; < French débâcle, derivative of débâcler to unbar, clear, equivalent to dé- dis- 1 + bâcler to bar ≪ Latin baculum stick, rod
Explanation
Use debacle to refer to a fiasco, disaster, or great failure. If several dogs run onto the field during the big baseball game, tripping players and chewing up the bases, you can call the whole event a debacle. Debacle is sometimes used to describe a military defeat. If your army retreats, that's one thing. If your army is outmaneuvered and ends up huddled in a valley, surrounded on all sides by the enemy, forced to sing 90s sitcom theme songs by their savage captors — that's a debacle. Debacle comes from the French débâcler, "to clear," — the prefix des- means "completely, utterly" and the verb bacler means "to block."
Vocabulary lists containing debacle
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"The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell
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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.
Appeared in the October 15, 2025, print edition as 'Death of a ‘Clean Energy’ Debacle'.
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 14, 2025
Tellingly, in his career-spanning 2014 anthology “Bent Larsen’s Best Games: Fighting Chess with the Great Dane,” the Danish GM skips right over without a single mention the Debacle in Denver.
From Washington Times • May 10, 2022
Good one, as long as you forget Renner's role in the Great Jeremy Renner Vanity App Debacle of 2019.
From Salon • Nov. 24, 2021
Perfect proof was provided Sunday in Big D, where the unbeaten Steelers nearly had a Big Debacle against the woeful Cowboys.
From Seattle Times • Nov. 9, 2020
La Debacle has been described as "a prose epic of modern war," and vast though the subject be, it is treated in a manner that is powerful, painful, and pathetic.
From A Zola Dictionary; the Characters of the Rougon-Macquart Novels of Emile Zola; by Patterson, J. G
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.
