Definition of "crash" []

• To break violently or noisily; smash. (verb-intransitive)
• To undergo sudden damage or destruction on impact: Their car crashed into a guardrail. The airplane crashed over the ocean. (verb-intransitive)
• To make a sudden loud noise: breakers crashing against the rocks. (verb-intransitive)
• To move noisily or so as to cause damage: went crashing through the woods. (verb-intransitive)
• To undergo a sudden severe downturn, as a market or economy. (verb-intransitive)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The _crash, crash, crash, crash_ of four heavy shells, one following another almost as quickly as you would read the words, focused all one's attention on that point."
• "You can just hear, through the crash, the shriek of a third and fourth shell as they come tearing down the vault of heaven -- _crash -- crash_."
• "For some odd reason, people who work in a field where the word crash brings to mind human injury rather than balky software tend to work slowly and methodically."