keel over

Verb

keel over (third-person singular simple present keels over, present participle keeling over, simple past and past participle keeled over)

1. (also, figuratively, intransitive) Of a vessel: to roll so far on its side that it cannot recover; to capsize or turn turtle.
   • What a tiny little schooner! But is it not bold to spread both sails? And see, now that we have come round to the wind, how the skiff keels over.1844 May, Peter von Geist, “A Piscatorial Eclogue”, in The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, volume XXIII, number 5, New York, N.Y.: Published by John Allen, Nassau-Street, →OCLC, page 462
   • [H]is bandaged cry was, to beach him on the whale's topmost back. Nothing loath, his bowsman hauled him up and up, through a blinding foam that blent two whitenesses together; till of a sudden the boat struck as against a sunken ledge, and keeling over, spilled out the standing mate.1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “The Town-Ho’s Story. (As Told at the Golden Inn.)”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley...
2. (idiomatic, intransitive) To collapse in a faint; to black out, to swoon.
   • We should all go inside before somebody keels over from the heat.
   • A huge double-fisted fellow hits Marshall a biff on the ear; the General keels over and catches in his fall another gentleman, who hits a fourth, and the party clinging, all fall through a window, and drop through a partly closed cellar-door.1854 June, “Putting Him Through”, in Yankee Notions, volume III, number 6, Published by T. W. Strong, engraver and printer, 98 Nassau Street, N.Y., →OCLC, page 182
3. (idiomatic, intransitive) To die.
   • The enemy had planted a piece of ordinance within gun-shot of the fort during the night, and the first thing in the morning they commenced a brisk cannonade, point-blank, against the spot where I was snoring. I turned out pretty smart, and mounted the rampart. The gun was charged again, a fellow...1834, David Crockett, chapter XIII, in A Narrative of the Life of David Crockett, of the State of Tennessee. Written by Himself, Philadelphia, Pa.: E[dward] L[awrence] Carey & A[braham] Hart; Boston...
   • A staunch old ship she was too, […] There was no hurry in her building. Mynheer Von Dert hewed the logs for her keel, and slept with his fathers. His son Petrus prepared the keelson, then keeled over, and was laid beside his venerable sire.1876, James J. Brooks, “The Good Ship ‘Netherland’”, in The Adventures of a United States Detective. A Series of Interesting Sketches Illustrating the Operations of the Whisky Ring in Their Evasions...