dead water

English

Noun

dead water (countable and uncountable, plural dead waters)

1. (nautical) The eddying water under a slow-moving ship's counter, or a similar area of stationary fluid or gas in advance of a concave angle, which can occur when there is strong vertical density stratification (due to salinity or temperature or both), and can cause ships to become hard to control.
   • 1967, David W. Taylor, Report - Naval Ship Research and Development Center, page 295:

     A "deadwater," that is a region occupied by stationary fluid or by gas at suitable pressure, ahead of a concave angle was shown to be possible by Villat.

2. A region in a body of moving water (or similar body of fluid in motion) where the water (fluid) is relatively stationary, or stagnant.
   • 1905, Acadiensis - Volume 5, page 135:

     Some of our party went down the deadwater for a short distance in it and came back with three black ducks and one golden eye.

   • 1964, Advances in Chemical Engineering, page 160:

     The deadwater region is viewed to be in backmix flow and to be interchanging fluid slowly with the active backmix flow region.

   • 1981, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, NUREG/CR. - Volume 1322, page 4-17:

     The river is divided into two regions: the main channel and a deadwater zone.

   the Deadwaters of the Penobscot River

   • 2013, Doug Roy, The River Runs Deep, page 99:

     On other days we journeyed as far up the main branch as far as we could, sometimes following small brooks back to their deadwaters.

Alternative forms

• deadwater

See also

• dead pool