Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Simple past tense and past participle of jack-knife.

Etymologies

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Examples

  • Ice-coated roads were nearly empty in Dallas, where the few motorists who braved the unfamiliar terrain slowed to a crawl as they passed jack-knifed tractor-trailers on slick highways.

    Colossal Storm Roars Through Nation's Heartland, Warnings From Texas To Maine AP 2011

  • The treacherous driving led to many accidents, from fender-benders in quiet neighborhoods to jack-knifed trucks that stopped expressways.

    Winter Storm Sweeps Across the Northeast Cameron McWhirter 2011

  • It was a fearsome thing, of a kind to wake the dead, and I blew and blew, but the jack-knifed backs never unclasped.

    The Golden Poppy 2010

  • The A66 trans-Pennine route was closed after a number of lorries jack-knifed near Stainmore in Cumbria, and there were several collisions on the M6.

    More snow forecast for UK 2012

  • The truck jack-knifed and overturned, spilling its cargo.

    Embalming fluid spill on I-70 Elizabeth Flock 2011

  • They pondered this for a minute; then the woman said something in an undertone to the little girl, and both backs jack-knifed as the slaughter recommenced.

    The Golden Poppy 2010

  • Ice-coated roads were nearly empty in Dallas, where the few motorists who braved the unfamiliar terrain slowed to a crawl as they passed jack-knifed tractor-trailers on slick highways.

    Colossal Storm Roars Through Nation's Heartland, Warnings From Texas To Maine AP 2011

  • The traffic jam continued for another couple of km, and then we found its cause: a jack-knifed and battered horse-box, with another horse standing calmly beside the road.

    President Kaczyński burkesworks 2010

  • While irrelevant, the weather man, an expert afterall, explained freezing rain as supercooled raindrops passing through a subfreezing layer of air and then freezing with the impact of a 18-wheeler jack-knifed into a Mini-Cooper as it hits the surface.

    Five 2010

  • All gather at the windows to witness the jack-knifed logging truck dropping its cargo onto the frontage road.

    Assumption 2010

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