distress flag

American  

noun

1. any flag flown by a vessel to show that it is in distress, as an ensign flown at half-mast or upside down.

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Example Sentences

That marked the third distress flag on Kodak earnings this year and caused the company's stock to plunge $8.25 per share in two days.

From Time Magazine Archive

She subsisted on food that floated in from the wreck, until a passing schooner spotted the bright yellow dress she had hoisted as a distress flag.

From Time Magazine Archive

As the other whaling vessels answering the Brunswick's distress flag arrived, each vessel's master�as captains of commercial ships are usually called�came aboard to survey the damage.

From Time Magazine Archive

Her cargo had shifted so far forward that it had turned her right upon end, but she couldn’t sink, owing to the air in the compartments that the water hadn’t got into; and on the top of the whole thing was the distress flag flying from the pole which stuck out over the stern.

From Project Gutenberg

Says I to Tom, `The thing we've got to do is to put up some kind of a spar with a rag on it fur a distress flag, so that we'll lose no time bein' took off.'

From Project Gutenberg