Wiktionary
stop dead
vb. (context intransitive idiomatic English) To stop suddenly.
WordNet
stop dead
v. stop moving or become immobilized; "When he saw the police car he froze" [syn: freeze]
Usage examples of "stop dead".
Miles's brain seemed to stop dead for a full three minutes at the sheer absurd beauty of it all, till some throat-clearing from Vorob'yev broke the spell, and the party moved on again.
It was unrivalled horsemanship, and Cecil admired immensely the manner in which, at the end of the frenzied performance, these men, drunk with powder, would wheel their horses sharply while at full gallop, and stop dead.