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desert a sinking ship

Idioms  

  1. Abandon a failing enterprise before it is too late. For example, After seeing the company's financial statement, he knew it was time to desert a sinking ship. This metaphoric expression alludes to rats, which leave a vessel when it founders in a storm or runs aground so as to escape drowning. It was transferred to human behavior by about 1600.

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.

If rats desert a sinking ship, mice teem over this one.

From Time Magazine Archive

The first to desert a sinking ship is the first to discover the ship is sinking.

From Time Magazine Archive

One divined a scurrying as of rats about to desert a sinking ship.

From The False Faces Further Adventures from the History of the Lone Wolf by Vance, Louis Joseph

I suppose I should say that it was ever the custom of rats to desert a sinking ship.

From Captivating Mary Carstairs by Crosby, Raymond Moreau

Sailors tell us that the rats desert a sinking ship.

From Verner's Pride by Wood, Henry, Mrs.

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.