Word.ws English Dictionary

train wreck

train wreck noun: a train crash.

train wreck: a train crash
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Noun

train wreck (plural train wrecks)

  1. A train crash.
  2. The wreckage resulting from a train crash.
  3. (figuratively) A disaster, especially one which is large, chaotic, and readily seen by public observers.
    • There is a feeling in Washington that we are gathering at the side of the track to watch a gigantic economic train wreck one of these days.1986 September 1, Hugh Sidey, “The Presidency: Colliding with Realities”, in Time, archived from the original on 21 Dec 2008
    • "Your personal life has been, and is, a train wreck."2007, Mel Odom, Blood Evidence, →ISBN, page 168
  4. (figuratively) Someone who is unbalanced and considered a mess, a disaster, one who is suffering personal ruin.
    • She may have been a train wreck, but she was a train wreck people still can't seem to get enough of. The sordid but fascinating story of her vicious, no-holds-barred battle with life is one of the most gripping, sex-soaked biographies in years.2007, Donna Hogan, “blurb”, in Train Wreck: The Life and Death of Anna Nicole Smith, Phoenix Books Incorporated, →ISBN
    • […] women, by and large, do not like themselves very much: their ambition gaps, their orgasm gaps, their imposter syndrome, […] their trainwrecks, and their need for trainwrecks; the enduring, self-loathing need to find someone about whom they can say well, at least I'm not that girl.2016, Sady Doyle, Trainwreck, page 24

Verb

train wreck (third-person singular simple present train wrecks, present participle train wrecking, simple past and past participle train wrecked)

  1. (idiomatic, informal, transitive) To ruin utterly and catastrophically, to cause to end in disaster.
    • […] basic fundamental communication steps must be achieved so not to train wreck the new employee.2003, Peter A. Laporta,, Ignite the Passion, AuthorHouse, →ISBN, page 57
    • "I want this, too, I want you. Like really want you more than anything I've wanted in a long time. But if you force it, you're going to train wreck the whole thing in a fiery mess over a steep cliff with jagged rocks below."2011, Jaden Lane, If You Could Read My Mind, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN, page 157

train wreck meaning in Tamil

train wreck in Tamil

தொடரித் தகர்வுப்பேரழிவு

Synonyms of train wreck

All synonyms of train wreck

Forms of train wreck

Noun
pluraltrain wrecks
alternative formtrainwreck
alternative formtrain-wreck
Verb
third-person singular presenttrain wrecks
present participletrain wrecking
past participletrain wrecked
pasttrain wrecked

Questions about train wreck

What does train wreck mean?
Train wreck means a train crash.
What is train wreck in Tamil?
Train wreck in Tamil is தொடரித் தகர்வுப்பேரழிவு. See Train wreck meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is train wreck?
Train wreck can be a noun or a verb.
What is the plural of train wreck?
The plural of train wreck is train wrecks.

Words near train wreck in the dictionary

  1. train times
  2. train track
  3. train track braces
  4. train tracks
  5. train up
  6. train wreck
  7. train wrecked
  8. train wrecking
  9. train wrecks
  10. train-bearer
  11. train-bearers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: train wreck (page history and authors); train wreck (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-train wreck.wav.

Cite this entry: “train wreck.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/train_wreck. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.