What's the difference between disaster and disastrous?

Disaster


Definition:

  • (n.) An unpropitious or baleful aspect of a planet or star; malevolent influence of a heavenly body; hence, an ill portent.
  • (n.) An adverse or unfortunate event, esp. a sudden and extraordinary misfortune; a calamity; a serious mishap.
  • (v. t.) To blast by the influence of a baleful star.
  • (v. t.) To bring harm upon; to injure.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) Following mass disasters and individual deaths, dentists with special training and experience in forensic odontology are frequently called upon to assist in the identification of badly mutilated or decomposed bodies.
  • (2) Crown prince Sultan Bin Abdel Aziz said yesterday that the state had "spared no effort" to avoid such disasters but added that "it cannot stop what God has preordained.
  • (3) Documents seen by the Guardian show that blood supplies for one fiscal year were paid for by donations from America’s Office of Foreign Disaster Assistance (OFDA) and Britain’s Department for International Development (DfID) – and both countries have imposed economic sanctions against the Syrian government.
  • (4) Travel around Fukushima today and there is little evidence of disaster or trauma.
  • (5) In the UK, George Osborne used this to his advantage, claiming "Britain faces the disaster of having its international credit rating downgraded" even after Moody's ranked UK debt as "resilient".
  • (6) Sometimes it can seem as if the history of the City is the history of its crises and disasters, from the banking crisis of 1825 (which saw undercapitalised banks collapse – perhaps the closest historic parallel to the contemporary credit crunch), through the Spanish panic of 1835, the railway bust of 1837, the crash of Overend Gurney, the Kaffir boom, the Westralian boom, the Marconi scandal, and so on and on – a theme with endless variations.
  • (7) Dealers speculated that Facebook's army of bankers had stepped in to stop the shares falling below $38, a move that would have landed the social network with a public relations disaster on its first day as a public company.
  • (8) "If it hadn't been for the nuclear disaster, we would never have given this project a second thought."
  • (9) This could spell disaster for small farmers, says Million Belay, co-ordinator of the Alliance for Food Sovereignty in Africa.
  • (10) Simply lengthening the working age bracket is a potential disaster, unless the inequalities at the heart of the policy are addressed in a detailed and sensible way and we achieve full employment.
  • (11) The accident on 10 April 2010, killed the president, first lady and dozens of senior officials, in the worst Polish air disaster since the second world war.
  • (12) Beijing says the island outposts will serve maritime search and rescue missions, disaster relief, environmental protection as well as undefined military purposes.
  • (13) Wanchu Sherpa, chairman of Everest Summitteers Association of Nepal and two time summiteer himself, told the Guardian shortly after the accident that “nothing can be done to prevent such events” which he described as “simply natural disasters that are unavoidable”.
  • (14) Matteo Renzi, the Italian leader who has argued it would be a disaster if Britain left the EU, suggested defensiveness about freedom of movement led to nowhere apart from opening the door to “right-wing xenophobia and nationalism” in Europe .
  • (15) "Machineless" NH suggests the possibility of machineless CAVHD, which could provide dialysis and parenteral nutrition to many acute renal failure patients after a major disaster.
  • (16) Families fear that after April’s disaster the cycle of poverty in the region will be intensified.
  • (17) Salem County (NJ) Memorial Hospital cooperated in an areawide disaster drill and found that it took large doses of planning and cooperation to coordinate the effort.
  • (18) A chronology of the disaster, involving two helicopter crashes which left 11 dead, is presented.
  • (19) But even away from this disaster, facts about the industry's cost and scope to meet Europe's energy needs should be enough to give nuclear supporters pause.
  • (20) It cannot be established whether or not seasickness contributed to the cause of death in the case of the Ocean Ranger victims, but it did occur in 75% or more of TEMPSC occupants in the other four rig disasters.

Disastrous


Definition:

  • (a.) Full of unpropitious stellar influences; unpropitious; ill-boding.
  • (a.) Attended with suffering or disaster; very unfortunate; calamitous; ill-fated; as, a disastrous day; a disastrous termination of an undertaking.

Example Sentences:

  • (1) However, we have observed cracks on the Dacron fibers, fiber fracture, fiber protrusion, and poor attachment to the diaphragm, which can cause potentially disastrous complications.
  • (2) This proposal is a purely partisan move that will backfire on the government disastrously.” The Green party accused Osborne of making “efforts to limit the democratic scrutiny of his austerity agenda”.
  • (3) They moved to shore up May’s position after a weekend of damaging leaks and briefings from inside the cabinet, believed to be fuelled by some of those jostling to succeed the prime minister after her disastrous election result.
  • (4) To leave the Euro, says Clarke, would be "disastrous" for the Greeks.
  • (5) There are no easy answers to these problems, but we must recognise that a muri approach is potentially disastrous.
  • (6) Prior planning of the coverage before the excision pays dividends by preventing disastrous complications.
  • (7) But Frank argues the disastrous attempt at curbing markets through currency reform in 2009 has shown the cost of turning back from change.
  • (8) Getting them to safety is now vital.” While the EU’s hotspots approach improved the fingerprinting and security vetting of migrants, the auditors said that funding and relocation “bottlenecks” had extended the detention of migrants, with disastrous consequences for children.
  • (9) He argued that it was vital that we “should give the people of this country a chance to decide”, and that “[the nation was witnessing] a continuation of that old and disastrous system where a few men in charge of the state, wielding the whole force of the state, make secret engagements and secret arrangements, carefully veiled from the knowledge of the people…” This, and a lot more little-known information on the road to the first world war is given in Douglas Newton’s book The Darkest Days .
  • (10) However, the shadow foreign secretary, Douglas Alexander , is adamant Labour could not afford to spend the first two years of government wrestling with a referendum on Europe, pointing to the energy it had expended on the near-disastrous no campaign for the Scotland independence vote.
  • (11) The disastrous launches of SimCity and Battlefield 4 , the confining and somewhat invasive nature of the publisher’s Origin digital gaming platform and the voraciously monetised smartphone version of Dungeon Keeper, have kicked further dents in its reputation.
  • (12) Austin said: "Since the House of Lords judgment, the police have increased their use of the tactic of kettling, with disastrous consequences for the right to peaceful protest and the safety of protesters.
  • (13) By trading Holiday for Noel, the 76ers are effectively ending the Andrew Bynum experiment after one disastrous year and seem likely to start a rebuilding process.
  • (14) Casting a vote for any of the alternative party or independent candidates in November could have truly disastrous effects.
  • (15) If she learns anything from this disastrous outing, I hope itʼs that if sheʼs going to allow the music industry to play her as a sex object, she needs to at least own it.
  • (16) Mike Griffiths, headteacher at Northampton School for Boys, the first high-performing school to become an academy after Gove became secretary of state for education in May 2010, said the issue would not only have a potentially disastrous effect on pupils who failed to get a necessary C grade in English, but also on those hoping to study at elite institutions who fell short of getting As or A*s. "If you are applying to a Russell Group university, for instance, to study medicine or law, and all the applicants have a string of A*s, they will look back to the GCSEs and see a B in English – and that could decide your fate," he said.
  • (17) As well as causing a breakdown in trust between the north and the capital, and between communities in the north, caused by the occupation, the conflict has been economically disastrous.
  • (18) "People forget that I discussed two types of disaster in my book: disastrous developments and disastrous failures to develop."
  • (19) In 1993, at the Branch Davidian religious compound outside Waco, Texas, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms didn’t wait for the sect leader, David Koresh, to leave before attempting to arrest him and got into a gun battle that claimed 10 victims and led to a disastrous 51-day siege culminating in dozens more deaths.
  • (20) Lord of the Rings made him the doomed anti-hero , he was easily the best thing in the disastrous Troy, giving Odysseus guile, wit and that familiar, rough-edged charm, and he terrified TV viewers as property developer John Dawson in the dark and brilliant Red Riding .