casualty
Americannoun
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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
Explanation
In wartime, you'll hear the word casualty used often for someone killed or injured. But casualty can also refer to deaths or injuries suffered in an accident or some other unfortunate event. The term "casualties of war" has been around for a while and refers to the ugly downside of military victory. Anyone who loses life or limb, either in the fighting or as a civilian, is called a casualty. You can also use this word figuratively: if a local elementary school loses funding for their art classes and after-school activities, you can say that the students are casualties of budget cuts.
Vocabulary lists containing casualty
The Things They Carried
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The American Civil War
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A Long Way Gone
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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.
Figures from Transport Scotland show that, on average between 2020 and 2024, car users aged 16 to 22 had a much higher casualty rate than older age groups.
From BBC • May 25, 2026
Los Angeles County Fire Department personnel responded to a call of a mass casualty event around 9:30 a.m.
From Los Angeles Times • May 13, 2026
Now it looks like Doug Beattie is about to become the first high profile casualty.
From BBC • May 12, 2026
Secret Service agents acted swiftly and captured the man without a casualty.
From The Wall Street Journal • Apr. 26, 2026
After twelve weeks of fighting in France, the SS-HJ paid a heavy toll: In all, casualty lists include 8,626 SS-HJ soldiers.
From "Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow" by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
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.
