to empty the clip
1
9.9
- phrasal verb
- Informal
:
vaciar el cargador
- Now two of them are hanging from the catwalk—sitting ducks—and the PENGUIN is determined to empty the clip.
Examples
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In a moment of panic, he had to empty the clip to defend himself.
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Got a Number 45 here ... emptied the clip.
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Empty the clip!
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Empty the clip!
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Empty the clip.
-
She empties the clip at the doorway.
Fiction book (1997) -
He empties the clip.
Fiction book (1997) -
The soldier was trained to empty the clip quickly in case of an ambush.
-
During the training exercise, the recruit learned how to empty the clip effectively.
Antonyms
How Complete
Surface Forms
Morphology
empty + the + clip
The meaning is directly built from 'empty' (to clear out) + 'clip' (a container holding cartridges), so a B1 learner who knows both words would infer that the instruction is to remove the clip's contents (i.e., all bullets). The phrasing is compositional and follows normal verb + object semantics; any slight ambiguity about whether removal is by firing or unloading would be resolved by context, so overall it is transparent.
Etymology
The phrase empty the clip comes from a simple picture: a small metal holder of bullets called a clip in a gun. When someone shoots until there are no bullets left they empty the clip, so the phrase means 'to fire all the bullets'.