the.com/shipwreck
The sea's way of editing your plans down to nothing.
means The destruction or sinking of a ship, usually by storm, collision, or running aground — and by extension, any plan or life that breaks apart catastrophically.
from A straightforward compound: 'ship' plus 'wreck.' The 'wreck' half traces back to Old Norse 'vrek,' meaning something driven ashore by the sea, which came into English via Anglo-Norman 'wrec' — originally the law of what washes up on beaches belonged to the crown. So 'wreck' first meant flotsam and salvage rights before it meant ruin. Bolt 'ship' onto the front and you get a word that's been sinking vessels in English since the medieval period.
- global count
- an estimated three million shipwrecks litter ocean floors
- best preserved
- cold, low-oxygen, low-light water slows decay for centuries
- legal term
- flotsam, jetsam, and lagan each have different ownership rules
- deepest found
- a WWII destroyer wreck sits over 20,000 feet down