to jump on a sinking ship
- idiom
- Informal
:
subirse a un barco que se hunde
- Investors who jump on a sinking ship often end up regretting their decisions.
Examples
-
By joining that unpopular startup, he was really jumping on a sinking ship.
-
Don't jump on a sinking ship!
-
Many cautioned against buying shares, saying it would be like jumping on a sinking ship.
-
Why would you jump on a sinking ship?
-
Investing in that failing company feels like you're just jumping on a sinking ship without considering the risks involved.
-
Many employees felt hesitant to jump on a sinking ship when the company started laying off staff.
-
He realized that supporting the struggling project was like jumping on a sinking ship, knowing it might not succeed.
Antonyms
How Risky
- Informal
91
3.3
∞
1.0
16
3.5
50
3.5
Surface Forms
Morphology
jump + on + a + sinking + ship
Both parts are compositionally interpretable: 'jump on' (to join eagerly) plus 'sinking ship' (a vessel that is failing, metaphorically a failing project) yields the meaning 'join a failing or doomed venture.' Although the phrase uses a metaphor, the mapping from the literal parts to the figurative sense is straightforward and cross-linguistically common, so a B1 learner who knows the constituents can reliably infer the meaning.
Etymology
The idiom jump on a sinking ship comes from the simple picture of someone jumping onto a ship that is already sinking, so joining it will not help and may end badly. So it means 'to join a failing project'.