(n.) Any great misfortune or cause of misery; -- generally applied to events or disasters which produce extensive evil, either to communities or individuals.
(n.) A state or time of distress or misfortune; misery.
Example Sentences:
(1) But if nothing changes, nothing will change, and these calamities will be with us once more.
(2) 18) Dallas Cowboys Last season: 8-8 Needs: Offensive line, safety, defensive tackle, running back Pick: Kenny Vaccaro, safety, Texas Tony Romo often carries the can for the Cowboys' offensive calamities, but the truth is that not many quarterbacks look great when they are running for their lives.
(3) They did not look like Stoke, exactly, they kept the ball on the floor a bit more than their opponents and did not go backwards quite so much, but in the first half at least there were two sides short of attacking ideas and genuine penetration and for either to score a goal it seemed likely a dead-ball routine or a defensive calamity would have to be involved.
(4) QPR appear to be on the verge of calamity at any point in defence.
(5) SJ Closs Edinburgh He is the Daffy Duck of politics – confident and self-satisfied, leading to calamity; then he pops up again, unabashed • As a fellow economist I fully endorse Larry Elliott’s demolition of Tory party assertions that all is well for the UK’s growing economy, and that Britain is paying its way ( The Tories’ ticking economic timebomb , 20 April).
(6) This system has now been refined to be used prospectively during the management stage of a calamity.
(7) Those who backed the wars in Iraq and Libya feel tainted by the bloodshed in the calamities that followed.
(8) US and Canadian oil policies, especially the tar sands schemes in Alberta, would increase the chances of global calamities, the imposters told their audience - but reassured them that the industry could keep "fuel flowing" by transforming the billions of people who died into oil.
(9) But they should be manageable and worth taking for the wider economic gains, notably averting what might have been an economic calamity.
(10) The community's children have been especially vulnerable to these calamities.
(11) The 2007 campaign was marked by dirty tricks charges against the Huhne camp by the man he (allegedly) dubbed "Calamity Clegg".
(12) I stand to appeal on behalf of the government and the people of Vanuatu that the global community give a lending hand in responding to these very current calamities that have struck us,” he said.
(13) The Crystal World is surely Ballard's most gorgeous calamity: apocalypse not as abolition but as transfiguration.
(14) By calculating the medical severity index, which is the product of the casualty load and the severity of the incident, and comparing this figure with the available total capacity of the medical services, which is the medical rescue capacity, the medical transport capacity and the hospital treatment capacity, the dispatcher at the control center can fairly quickly and precisely identify if a calamity is to be regarded as a disaster or not and if the region can cope with the situation.
(15) In Scotland, meanwhile, Labour has suffered a devastating calamity.
(16) But if the political will existed, calamity could be avoided with a fairly modest increase in the budget allocation .
(17) The disease that has brought these calamities to the pretty hills of Jinotega, in Nicaragua's central highlands, is new to most of the farmers I meet.
(18) Beckett, whose influence on Walsh is palpable, and Pinter would recognise that idea that beneath the surface of everyday life lays a gaping black hole: indeed Pinter from his youth frequently quoted a phrase of Cardinal Newman that creation is a vast "aboriginal calamity".
(19) Air brakes that would have prevented the disaster failed because they were powered by an engine that was shut down by firefighters as they dealt with a fire shortly before the calamity occurred, the head of the railway that operated the train said on Monday.
(20) The droughts will be far worse than the one in California – or those seen in ancient times, such as the calamity that led to the decline of the Anasazi civilizations in the 13 th century, the researchers said.
Imprecation
Definition:
(n.) The act of imprecating, or invoking evil upon any one; a prayer that a curse or calamity may fall on any one; a curse.
Example Sentences:
(1) Because the governments are relatively powerless to affect US policy toward them, they turn their energies to repressing and keeping down their own populations, with results in resentment, anger and helpless imprecations that do nothing to open up societies where secular ideas about human history and development have been overtaken by failure and frustration, as well as by an Islamism built out of rote learning and the obliteration of what are perceived to be other, competitive forms of secular knowledge.
(2) Mr Clegg could declare without irony that the Lib Dems belong in power, and at last lay to rest the lingering echo of David Steel's hubristic imprecation to go home and prepare for power.
(3) It begins in bravura style with sirens and a clap of thunder, and then – judging by the excerpts we hear – is thrillingly noisy and aggressive, indeed a return to the familiar Wu landscape of sinister soul samples, whiplash drums, and dire threats and imprecations, updated with the occasional reference to Harry Potter.
(4) As in the case of China, one does not have to regard Putin’s moves and motives favorably to understand the logic behind them, nor to grasp the importance of understanding that logic instead of issuing imprecations against it.
(5) EU gives Poland two months to scrap changes to its highest court Read more So far, Kaczyński has concluded he can ignore imprecations from Brussels or half-hearted protests from members with their minds on other matters.
(6) Of course they and my brother Don, despite my stuttered imprecations, drove through the night from Edinburgh.