debris
nounUK /ˈdɛbɹi/ · AU, NZ, US /dəˈbɹiː/
Etymology Borrowed from French débris, itself from dé- (“de-”) + bris (“broken, crumbled”), or from Middle French debriser (“to break apart”), from Old French debrisier, itself from de- + brisier (“to break apart, shatter, bust”), from Frankish *bristijan, *bristan, *brestan (“to break violently, shatter, bust”), from Proto-Germanic *brestaną (“to break, burst”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰrest- (“to separate, burst”). Cognate with Old High German bristan (“to break asunder, burst”), Old English berstan (“to break, shatter, burst”), German bersten (“to burst”). More at burst.
1
Rubble, wreckage, scattered remains of something destroyed.
- His neighbors were still ripping out debris. But Mr. Ryan, a retired bricklayer who built his house by hand 30 years ago only to lose most of it to Hurricane Sandy, was already hard at work rebuilding.2012 December 21, David M. Halbfinger, Charles V. Bagli, Sarah Maslin Nir, “On Ravaged Coastline, It’s Rebuild Deliberately vs. Rebuild Now”, in The New York Times:
- But signalman Bridges was never to answer driver Gimbert's desperate question. A deafening, massive blast blew the wagon to shreds, the 44 high-explosive bombs exploding like simultaneous hits from the aircraft they should have been dropped from. The station was instantly reduced to bits of debris, and the line to a huge crater.2022 January 12, Benedict le Vay, “The heroes of Soham...”, in RAIL, number 948, archived from the original on 21 Dec 2020, page 43:
1 more example
- Melissa Foley clears debris in her neighborhood as the San Lorenzo River rises in Felton on Saturday, January 14.2023 January 16, “California’s flooding, in pictures”, in CNN, archived from the original on 17 Mar 2023:
2
Litter and discarded refuse.
- [The researchers] noticed many of their pieces of [plastic marine] debris sported surface pits around two microns across. Such pits are about the size of a bacterial cell. Closer examination showed that some of these pits did, indeed, contain bacteria, […].2013 July 20, “Welcome to the plastisphere”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845, archived from the original on 08 Mar 2023:
- Derived terms
- biodebris, cellular debris, debris basin, debris field, debris mortar, debris response area, debrite, palynodebris, space debris