crumple

They were at work when the quakes struck, causing high-rise apartment buildings, shopping centers and schools to crumple.

From Barron's ● Jun. 29, 2026

To wrap a basketball, for example, you’d need to crumple the paper in a horrible mess or cut many pieces and tape them together with unsightly overlaps.

From Slate ● Jan. 21, 2026

His adversaries think he’ll crumple like yesterday’s broadsheet when they turn him away, and are perturbed to realize he’s more like the human equivalent of tissue hanging onto the heel of a shoe.

From Salon ● Sep. 23, 2025

He helped them to reach Game 7 and hit a trio of three-point shots early in the contest only to — alas — crumple to the floor when his Achilles tendon popped.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 23, 2025

I try to write her a letter, but I start three of them and then crumple them up and stick them in my backpack in case Mom reads my trash while I’m at school.

From "Ask the Passengers" by A.S. King

If people and institutions and businesses and government stand up to him, he crumples.

From Slate ● Jan. 23, 2026

As he talks, his face crumples into a sob.

From BBC ● May 8, 2025

Bynum keeps the camera on her as Jessie crumples her face in her hands.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 21, 2025

The situation is akin to a car that crumples in a crash: the vehicle absorbs the impact to protect passengers, but it is totaled.

From Scientific American ● Feb. 22, 2023

Her face crumples like she's about to cry even harder, but the sob never comes.

From "Starfish" by Akemi Dawn Bowman

I didn’t feel any affinity with the humanoid that smashed Bolt’s 100-meter record, but found the robot weightlifter that crumpled under a 15kg barbell and staggered into a table very relatable.

From Slate ● Sep. 27, 2026

The turning point came midway through the second half, when Swiss striker Breel Embolo crumpled in a heap, apparently the victim of a violent foul.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 12, 2026

Large, irregular, corpuscular clouds made of crumpled paper hung over the stage.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 28, 2026

The affected dormitory had shattered windows, blackened walls and a crumpled corrugated iron roof, an AFP journalist saw.

From Barron's ● May 28, 2026

There is an empty, deflated bag of microwave popcorn crumpled in the wastebasket.

From "The Sea in Winter" by Christine Day

Videos posted to social media and verified by AFP on Monday showed the catastrophic collapse of a shopping centre in General Santos, and an unoccupied school building crumpling.

From Barron's ● Jun. 9, 2026

After crumpling to the ice, McNabb immediately climbed to his feet, skated off the playing area and headed down the tunnel while holding a hand over his nose and mouth.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 5, 2026

Whether he was laughing, brooding or crumpling into sobs to create one of the most well-known and widely circulated meme GIFs of all time, Van Der Beek’s expressive appeal propelled him to virtually overnight superstardom.

From Salon ● Feb. 15, 2026

"But when we reached the clinic, we saw that it was closed. I didn't know it had shut down," he said, his face crumpling with agony.

From BBC ● Sep. 14, 2025

He turned toward the sound and stared in utter disbelief as the South Tower began to collapse, all one hundred ten stories, crumpling down on itself in an explosion of glass and smoke and steel.

From "Eleven" by Tom Rogers