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🚢 To get off 🌳 To remove bark
to debark

to debark

1 7.2
To get off a ship or plane and go onto land
  • verb
  • /dɪˈbɑrk/
translation icon : desembarcar
  • The soldiers were instructed to debark from the transport ship at sunrise.
  • passengers debark

Examples

  • They soon had the boat well up on the beach once Nithe, Myrddin, Anna, and Bear had debarked.

    Fiction book (1991)

  • All troops will debark for ground assault.

    The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

  • Mercifully, the actual flight would only take a tenth of the time it would take to debark the huge crowd.

    Fiction book (2002)

  • Essentially flu came back with a vengeance from Europe through the troops probably moving back and debarking at the port of Boston.

  • Having changed trains twice more since we left him, TIPTREE debarks at a deserted local stop.

    Fiction book (1992)

  • Interviewed this week after pulling into port at the island of Spitsbergen, she said one of her goals had been to debark on ice floes and measure them, but that it had been difficult to find any large enough to support her weight.

    Blog text (8)

  • It was Pauw who insisted as well on the inevitability of an ongoing and active degeneration in America, a point on which Buffon equivocated: no sooner did the Europeans debark.

    Academic text (2003)

  • They sailed out of New York Harbor on September 9 on the Walmar Castle, across the Atlantic Ocean, around the north of Ireland, and up the Firth of Clyde to Glasgow, where Hubble debarked on September 19.

    Academic text (1990)

  • All passengers must debark the aircraft before the next flight can board.

  • After the long journey, we finally debarked and set foot on the island.

Synonyms

to disembark
vsto debark
21 5.1

To leave a ship, plane, or other vehicle after a journey

also covers going ashore as well as leaving vehicles
to deplane
vsto debark
3 4.9

To leave a plane after it lands

is broader, used for leaving any vehicle or going ashore

Antonyms

to board
238 1.1

To get onto a vehicle like a train or plane

to embark
18 4.4

To get on a ship, plane, or other vehicle to begin a journey

How Formal

to disembark
21 5.1
to debark
1 7.2
going ashore
10 3.5
leave
  • Formal
148 4.2
to get off
170 2.5

Surface Forms

debark infinitive
debarked past
debarked past participle
debarking present participle
debarks third person singular

Morphology

debark = bark (semi-transparent) = de + bark

Formally de- + 'bark' (ship) is analyzable, but 'bark' meaning 'ship' is rare/archaic so typical learners knowing common 'bark' (tree/dog) will not reliably derive 'leave a ship'.

Etymology

Debark comes from the part de- meaning 'off' and is the opposite of embark, so it means to get 'off' a ship and is used for leaving a ship, plane, or other vehicle.