Definition of "plunge" []

• To thrust or throw forcefully into a substance or place: "Plunge the lobsters, head first, into a large pot of rapidly boiling salted water” ( Craig Claiborne). (verb-transitive)
• To cast suddenly, violently, or deeply into a given state or situation: "The street was plunged in cool shadow” ( Richard Wright). (verb-transitive)
• To fall or throw oneself into a substance or place: We plunged into the icy mountain lake. (verb-intransitive)
• To throw oneself earnestly or wholeheartedly into an activity or situation: plunged into my studies. (verb-intransitive)
• To enter or move headlong through something: The hunting dogs plunged into the forest. (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.

• "How did Louis Drax, a deeply disturbed, accident-prone nine-year-old, plunge from a cliff at a family picnic?"
• "It irrigates a score of mountain meadows before it makes the plunge and is clarified to crystal clearness in the next few rugged miles; and at the plunge from the highlands it generates half the power and all the lighting used on the ranch."
• "But keeping them in amid a market plunge is a goal that trading firms and even Ms. Schapiro say may prove complicated."