Crossword clues for happen
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
happen
verb
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a crash happens/occurs
▪ The three-vehicle crash happened on the corner of Ongar Road.
a miracle happens
▪ Then the miracle happened – there was a job, and I could have it.
a tragedy happens/occurs
▪ The tragedy happened shortly before 5pm on Saturday.
an accident happens (also an accident occursformal)
▪ No one saw the accident happen.
▪ Most road accidents occur in urban areas.
an attack happens/takes place (also an attack occursformal)
▪ The attack took place at around 10 pm Thursday.
an earthquake happens (also an earthquake occursformal)
▪ Scientists cannot predict when an earthquake will occur.
an event happens/takes place (also an event occursformal)
▪ The event took place last year.
an explosion takes place/happens
▪ The largest explosion took place at the main post office.
an incident happens
▪ The incident happened as Mrs Edwards was walking her dog.
an injury happens/occurs
▪ The injury occurred five minutes into the game.
bound to happen
▪ When you are dealing with so many patients, mistakes are bound to happen.
erosion happens/occurs
▪ The highest rates of erosion occur where soil is exposed to drought.
evolution happens/takes place (also evolution occursformal)
▪ We can see signs of evolution taking place in the world around us.
extraordinary thing to do/say/happen
▪ What an extraordinary thing to do!
happen/appear/change overnight
▪ Reputations are not changed overnight.
It...happened so fast
▪ It all happened so fast I didn’t even notice I was bleeding.
mistakes happen
▪ We’re very careful, but mistakes can happen.
sth happens when you least expect it
▪ Bad luck tends to happen when you least expect it.
sth is a disaster waiting to happen (=used to say that something is bad and will fail)
▪ The government’s educational reforms are a disaster waiting to happen.
the unthinkable happened
▪ Then the unthinkable happened and the boat started to sink.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADVERB
actually
▪ This, surely, was what had actually happened to Adam Verne-Smith.
▪ Perhaps some of these notions come close to what actually happened.
▪ They couldn't believe it was all real - that the nightmare was actually happening to them.
▪ What actually happened was that I was as drunk as anybody in the barracks the night all hell broke loose.
▪ Gregory's account of what actually happened is laconic in the extreme.
▪ Like most mythic events, the Six-Day War actually happened, but not quite the way people remember it.
▪ She still couldn't quite believe that all this was actually happening to her.
▪ Nevertheless, the theory works well if, using hindsight, one looks back at what has actually happened.
again
▪ He was determined never to let that mistake happen again.
▪ This happened again, and yet a third time.
▪ However, I really will be able to say to the magistrates that it won't happen again.
▪ He has got to assure Congress that it will never happen again.
▪ Once you have cured the water pollution problem, you will have to take steps to avoid it happening again.
▪ She had gone through it once on Sorrows and was terrified of its happening again.
▪ And then it happened again, and Kate had another twenty-four hours of the shakes.
▪ To prevent such a thing from happening again, Dole and the others want to amend the U. S. Constitution.
ever
▪ Thankfully, nothing like this has ever happened since.
▪ Has it ever happened to you?
▪ But Dot had thought it wouldn't ever happen to their baby.
▪ If anything ever happened to her, she was all set.
▪ She wrote poetry with impenetrable syntax about a life where nothing ever happened.
▪ What was the best thing that ever happened to you?
▪ Nothing like this had ever happened while Cedric still lived with Dorothy!
▪ Nothing like that had ever happened before.
here
▪ Such things did not, could not happen here.
▪ But there was no fluke, and no mistake, about what happened here Sunday.
▪ What the hell was happening here?
▪ A curious thing has happened here.
▪ After what happened here on April 15, 1989, the authorities were going to make sure there was no repetition.
▪ And the same thing could happen here.
▪ One would like to think that it's not going to happen here.
▪ You must come to Berlin, something better will happen here, they promised vaguely.
just
▪ Then maybe it had just happened.
▪ It just happens to work out like that.
▪ Matthew Spender's writing is at its best remembering the past as though it has just happened.
▪ It just happened that Bobby filled the bill in this case.
▪ And they just happen to be attached to a saint!
▪ It just happens that mutations that construct organisms which reproduce more efficiently are conserved over time.
▪ It had all seemed part of the wonder: that it should have happened just this Jubilee summer.
▪ Perhaps some of her corrections are subjective-she just happens to like one style better than another.
never
▪ That had never happened to her in her whole life before.
▪ But stories got told about things that never happened.
▪ I think we were near deluding ourselves that Harry had never happened, that we'd done it all ourselves.
▪ But after I got caught up in things at graduate school, that just never happened.
▪ Experience has shown that this virtually never happens.
▪ That scary scene in Gibson City was so far in the past, it sometimes felt as if it had never happened.
▪ It's something that should never happen.
▪ It had never happened, never would happen.
often
▪ As so often happens, the conversation becomes increasingly serious and philosophical.
▪ When a kid sprains her hand or jams her finger, which happens often, she tries to shake it out.
▪ It was not exactly what we were after but that is the way things often happen in our job.
▪ But then, as so often happens in science, more research complicated the picture.
▪ As often happens in summer, a climatic miracle occurred.
▪ That often happens from excessive use of the same chemicals.
▪ There had been a pair using this barn, but, as so often happens these days, they deserted their nest.
▪ She knew the worst often happened, worse than the worst you can imagine, and so you made provisions.
really
▪ To this day, I don't know what really happened to Kay Amin's body.
▪ The other 90 games would be played against teams from other divisions and the other league, assuming interleague play really happens.
▪ Has the revolution of 1989 been lost already, or did it never really happen at all?
▪ I feel kind of foolish admitting it, but it really happened in a dream.
▪ Frasier's attempts to piece together what really happened form the backbone of the novel.
▪ At least this is a step toward the truth, what really happened.
▪ Now Orlando's city chiefs are terrified that the lid is coming off what really happens in the city.
▪ There is much on what is really happening at universities.
when
▪ She couldn't imagine how she had allowed it to happen when everything within her head warned against it.
▪ What happens when a young husband and father is suddenly unable to work because of cancer?
▪ The best Monday shows happen when Shaun and Bez interact, and you get a real sense of their personalities.
▪ Readers who doubt this scenario might consider what happened when the savings and loans were deregulated during the eighties.
▪ It's clear that Fitzgerald enjoys an absolute authority, but prefers to see what happens when she reins it in.
▪ What happens when dreams die and depression sets in?
▪ Just what happens when you're on holiday!
▪ What happens when she arrives in the new environment?
■ NOUN
accident
▪ The reason she is able to deal with this is because she was a wonderful person before this accident ever happened.
▪ The accident happened because of a culture in which working practices were not checked, Whitehaven magistrates heard.
▪ Residents living south of the proposed annexation told the Weekly that car accidents on Wilmot happen all the time.
▪ Therefore, both over-confidence and under-confidence may play a part in creating an environment in which accidents happen more readily.
▪ The accident happened on Interstate 84 in Manchester, about 10 miles east of Hartford, during evening rush hour.
▪ We all know that accidents can happen to anyone, at any time.
▪ A student helicopter pilot wallowing around in a hover in a tight clearing is an accident waiting to happen.
event
▪ This is the sort of event which happens once every 50 years on average.
▪ In a phenomenologically complex universe, extremely improbable events are certain to happen.
▪ Pro-active public relations is when you are helping to make a situation or event happen and are keeping ahead of things.
▪ We might say that a probable event is one that happens in many or most possible worlds.
▪ What mattered here was how contemporaries chose to describe the events that happened in 1688-9.
▪ An improbable event is one that happens only in one or a few possible worlds.
▪ When the pressure is on to respond to an event after it happens, the client will then judge your professional competence.
▪ Carlson has infused the descriptions of the festivals with the charm of the region and the volunteers who make the event happen.
thing
▪ But by then John Butcher, the man with the power to make such things happen, had left for another appointment.
▪ But these things happen at Catalina.
▪ He'd never do nothing himself but, you know, things might happen.
▪ But that such things happened, and happened often, are part of the historic record.
▪ What is the worst possible thing that could happen?
▪ A number of things happened in the late 1990s, though, that seemed to create a new context.
▪ But in between all these things something happens which is only spoken of in hushed whispers.
▪ Yeah, George, same thing happened to the presidency under Richard Nixon.
things
▪ But if neither of these things happen, Labour will be forced to decide whether it is prepared to raise taxes.
▪ When you have the courage to make a Big Promise and the will to deliver on it, good things usually happen.
▪ I wasn't there long before things started to happen.
▪ We participate in making things happen.
▪ And the craziest things can happen at the last minute.
▪ Many things were happening at once, with dizzying speed.
▪ Struggling to his feet, he realised he was waving his sword. Things were happening too fast to keep up with.
▪ Instinctively we knew that terrible things were going to happen in our elderly aunts peaceful living room.
■ VERB
go
▪ Lee turned to face Philip and Philip knew immediately what was going to happen.
▪ No matter how much he tried to put it off, he already knew that it was going to happen this week.
▪ If you could see what is going to happen in the future, you could change it.
▪ That is not going to happen.
▪ Madeleine said: what's going to happen with the shrine in the woods?
▪ But change is going to happen.
▪ The point is, what is going to happen to these boys later.
▪ Months went by and nothing happened.
know
▪ Who knew what would happen between then and the morning?
▪ When the bomb was detonated down at Alamogordo, residents for hundreds of miles around knew something extraordinary had happened.
▪ He knew what was happening in the boathouse and it was too ordinary to convert into anything exciting.
▪ It was so smooth you hardly knew it-was happening.
▪ To this day, I don't know what really happened to Kay Amin's body.
▪ Magically everyone knew just what had happened.
▪ He wanted to know what had happened.
▪ We must know what is happening in New York.
let
▪ She dared not let it happen again.
▪ Waldon has vowed not to let a letdown happen.
▪ He was determined never to let that mistake happen again.
▪ To be deprived of his place on the mission was one thing that he was not prepared to let happen.
▪ But Cathy Freeman will not let that happen.
▪ Only baseball could have let this happen.
see
▪ She saw at once what was happening to her and to Rose, and where it could lead them both.
▪ They were also waiting to see what would happen.
▪ He decided to wait and see what happened in the other rehearsals.
▪ But no witness saw what happened.
▪ A few nights later, I took three or four at once, to see what happened.
▪ Quinn went on to the next day and decided to see what would happen.
▪ I saw it happen, and I couldn't do a thing to help them.
▪ We see this happening in networked markets.
tell
▪ And now I suppose I don't even have to tell you what happened?
▪ She called Kim, the trainer, on the phone and, in between uncontrollable sobs, told her what was happening.
▪ Some one has to tell him what's happening here.
▪ Even during the evacuation - more than 180,000 people were moved - most of them were not told what had happened.
▪ Ask the students who are watching to tell what happened.
▪ Every day the newspapers are telling you what happens to other people's children.
▪ I told him what had happened in Bloomsbury.
wait
▪ That suddenly went to being able to play conservatively and just wait and see what happened.
▪ NEAs are accidents waiting to happen.
▪ Mr. Haynes I shall wait to see what happens about the speed of motorway repairs.
▪ I hop into my truck, turn the key and wait as absolutely nothing happens.
▪ Let's wait and see what happens, Kit.
▪ Stagnant, they waited for something to happen.
▪ He would wait, he would wait to see what happened to Kurz.
▪ Then I snuggled in and waited for something to happen.
wonder
▪ They will be wondering what has happened to you.
▪ I often wonder what would have happened if I had not struggled so in the web.
▪ I wondered what had happened to them all.
▪ I sometimes nudge Miles and Evan to join me in wondering what 47 will happen next in a story.
▪ But a man could go nuts sitting around wondering about what might happen.
▪ I wonder what happened to the paper hymen on the toilet. l check my hair in the mirror.
▪ Athelstan stood there dreaming, wondering what was happening in St Erconwald's.
▪ Now lesson seven was crumpled and he would wonder how it happened.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
accidents (will) happen
▪ And if accidents happen, they happen.
▪ But some accidents happen because of their egocentric tendency to think of themselves as invulnerable.
▪ But worse is the fact that the same accidents happen time and time again.
▪ Everyone knows that hideous accidents happen, however precise modern weapons are supposed to be.
▪ Local fishermen say that, when accidents happen, the trawlers never stop.
▪ Therefore, both over-confidence and under-confidence may play a part in creating an environment in which accidents happen more readily.
▪ Where he went, accidents happened.
▪ Which is exactly how accidents happen.
an accident waiting to happen
▪ A student helicopter pilot wallowing around in a hover in a tight clearing is an accident waiting to happen.
▪ Another way of putting it would be that the dollar is an accident waiting to happen.
▪ Mr Stewart said that there was an accident waiting to happen and he feared lives would be lost.
▪ People living near the site say it was an accident waiting to happen.
▪ Unless, of course, it was an accident waiting to happen.
shit happens
▪ Yeah, well, shit happens.
▪ The only thing we know for sure is that shit happens.
▪ What we have here is proof of the axiom that shit happens.
sth was meant to be/happen
▪ Designed by Robert Von Hagge, it was meant to be hard.
▪ Imprinted with cell bars, the first Tricky Envelope was meant to be festooned with the Richard Nixon stamp.
▪ It was meant to be some kind of joke.
▪ Our protest was meant to be purely symbolic.
▪ Perhaps it's because none of this was meant to happen.
▪ She was meant to be illustrating a new book for children, a fantasy story by a well-known author.
▪ Technically he was meant to be in bed.
▪ The fit crew was meant to be Merrill Lynch.
there is no question of sth happening/sb doing sth
▪ Each has much to offer to the other and there is no question of one tradition being right and the other wrong.
▪ Even if the practice overspends its funds, there is no question of patients not getting the treatment they need.
▪ Since there is no means of changing the weather, there is no question of protest.
▪ This again suggests that the boys may have been in the wrong, which there is no question of in Ballantyne.
▪ This particularly applies where there is no question of a divorced previous spouse.
▪ This phenomenon is distinct from onomatopoeia - it is sometimes called sound symbolism: there is no question of auditory resemblance.
▪ Yet there is no question of one's hair rising.
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ Before I realised what was happening, the man had grabbed my bag and run off with it.
▪ For some time there had been predictions of a major earthquake, and then on April 19, 1906, it happened.
▪ I want to make things up with her, but I don't think it's going to happen.
▪ Look, when I turn the key, nothing happens.
▪ The accident happened at two o'clock this afternoon.
▪ The accident happened early on Tuesday morning.
▪ The strangest thing happened when I was in Singapore.
▪ We'd always feared that this might happen.
▪ What's happened? Why are you crying?
▪ You mustn't go there alone at night. Anything might happen!
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ At ninety-one it was bound to have happened before.
▪ But what will happen when the holders of all those assets outnumber the buyers?
▪ He telephoned you just after you'd gone and I told him what had happened.
▪ I couldn't understand what was happening to me and I began to sink deeper and deeper into the pit.
▪ Instead of standing idly by or opposing change, the union should become actively involved in making change happen.
▪ Look at what happened at Seattle, and the proposals of groups like Attac and Agir Ici.
▪ Whatever had happened, the experience had disturbed him.
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Happen
Happen \Hap"pen\ (h[a^]p"p'n), v. i. [imp. & p. p. Happened (-p'nd); p. pr. & vb. n. Happening.] [OE. happenen, hapnen. See Hap to happen.]
-
To come by chance; to come without previous expectation; to fall out.
There shall no evil happen to the just.
--Prov. xii. 21. -
To take place; to occur.
All these things which had happened.
--Luke xxiv. 14.To happen on, to meet with; to fall or light upon. ``I have happened on some other accounts.''
--Graunt.To happen in, to make a casual call. [Colloq.]
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Wiktionary
happen
adv. (qualifier: obsolete or dialect) maybe, perhaps. vb. To occur or take place.
WordNet
happen
v. come to pass; "What is happening?"; "The meeting took place off without an incidence"; "Nothing occurred that seemed important" [syn: hap, go on, pass off, occur, pass, fall out, come about, take place]
happen, occur, or be the case in the course of events or by chance; "It happens that today is my birthday"; "These things befell" (Santayana) [syn: befall, bechance]
chance to be or do something, without intention or causation; "I happen to have just what you need!"
come into being; become reality; "Her dream really materialized" [syn: materialize, materialise] [ant: dematerialize, dematerialize]
come upon, as if by accident; meet with; "We find this idea in Plato"; "I happened upon the most wonderful bakery not very far from here"; "She chanced upon an interesting book in the bookstore the other day" [syn: find, chance, bump, encounter]
Wikipedia
Usage examples of "happen".
When this happens, water is not properly reabsorbed in the kidney tubules and urination becomes abnormally copious.
I was staring up at the stars, thinking of the Gibson and McIlroy and that abo walking out alive, trying to picture what had really happened, my thoughts ranging and the truth elusive.
What would happen if she finally confessed to him that Bill had been an abusive husband?
Men and women bright enough to run a particle accelerator the size of a small planet likewise had to be at least somewhat aware that they were being manipulated, even as they let it happen.
How could they expect the Acceptor to report specifically when so much was happening!
Lotus and Crazy had probably been achored before they had realized something was happening.
If that happened, her son would challenge Acier in a way in which no one could take issue.
Commissioners--that is to say, Marshals Macdonald and Ney and the Duke of Vicenza had informed Marmont that they would dine with him as they passed through Essonne, and would acquaint him with all that had happened at Fontainebleau.
When the king heard what had happened he ordered the worthy actress to leave Madrid, to prevent the duke ruining himself.
He assured me that it should not happen again, that he had gone to Gorice to meet an actress, who had come there purposely to see him, and that he had also profited by the opportunity to sign a contract of marriage with a Venetian lady.
It may happen that with an unknown ore the first assay will be more or less unsatisfactory: but from it the necessity for adding more or less flour will be learnt, and a second assay, with the necessary modification of the charge, should give a good result.
It seemed impossible that the news had spread so quickly from Wes to filter into this group of customers, but then Addle only had to look as far as herself to know that it had happened before.
Sometimes personal messages were forwarded in multiple copies, by regular interstellar couriers, the service sometimes duplicating and reduplicating the message without reading it, and sending copies on to different places, as often happened when the exact location of the addressee was unknown.
Who understood everything which had happened to her and continued the fight with all the unyielding courage he loved and admired so much, refusing to surrender to the freak cataclysm which had exploded into her life.
That gloss is not to be understood as though the flesh of Christ were adored separately from its Godhead: for this could happen only, if there were one hypostasis of God, and another of man.