The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Crash \Crash\ (kr[a^]sh), v. t. [imp. & p. p. Crashed
   (kr[a^]sht); p. pr. & vb. n. Crashing.] [OE. crashen, the
   same word as crasen to break, E. craze. See Craze.]
   To break in pieces violently; to dash together with noise and
   violence. [R.]
   [1913 Webster]

         He shakt his head, and crasht his teeth for ire.
                                                  --Fairfax.
   [1913 Webster]

The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Crash \Crash\, v. i.
   1. To make a loud, clattering sound, as of many things
      falling and breaking at once; to break in pieces with a
      harsh noise.
      [1913 Webster]

            Roofs were blazing and walls crashing in every part
            of the city.                          --Macaulay.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. To break with violence and noise; as, the chimney in
      falling crashed through the roof.
      [1913 Webster]

The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Crash \Crash\, n.
   1. A loud, sudden, confused sound, as of many things falling
      and breaking at once.
      [1913 Webster]

            The wreck of matter and the crash of worlds.
                                                  --Addison.
      [1913 Webster]

   2. Ruin; failure; sudden breaking down, as of a business
      house or a commercial enterprise; as, the stock market
      crash of 1929.
      [1913 Webster]

            The last week of October 1929 remains forever
            imprinted in the American memory. It was, of course,
            the week of the Great Crash, the stock market
            collapse that signaled the collapse of the world
            economy and the Great Depression of the 1930s. From
            an all-time high of 381 in early September 1929, the
            Dow Jones Industrial Average drifted down to a level
            of 326 on October 22, then, in a series of traumatic
            selling waves, to 230 in the course of the following
            six trading days.
            The stock market's drop was far from over; it
            continued its sickening slide for nearly three more
            years, reaching an ultimate low of 41 in July 1932.
            But it was that last week of October 1929 that
            burned itself into the American consciousness. After
            a decade of unprecedented boom and prosperity, there
            suddenly was panic, fear, a yawning gap in the
            American fabric. The party was over.  --Wall street
                                                  Journal,
                                                  October 28,
                                                  1977.
      [PJC]

The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Crash \Crash\, n. [L. crassus coarse. See Crass.]
   Coarse, heavy, narrow linen cloth, used esp. for towels.
   [1913 Webster]

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2006):

crash
    n 1: a loud resonant repeating noise; "he could hear the clang
         of distant bells" [syn: clang, clangor, clangour,
         clangoring, clank, clash, crash]
    2: a serious accident (usually involving one or more vehicles);
       "they are still investigating the crash of the TWA plane"
       [syn: crash, wreck]
    3: a sudden large decline of business or the prices of stocks
       (especially one that causes additional failures) [syn:
       crash, collapse]
    4: the act of colliding with something; "his crash through the
       window"; "the fullback's smash into the defensive line" [syn:
       crash, smash]
    5: (computer science) an event that causes a computer system to
       become inoperative; "the crash occurred during a thunderstorm
       and the system has been down ever since"
    v 1: fall or come down violently; "The branch crashed down on my
         car"; "The plane crashed in the sea"
    2: move with, or as if with, a crashing noise; "The car crashed
       through the glass door"
    3: undergo damage or destruction on impact; "the plane crashed
       into the ocean"; "The car crashed into the lamp post" [syn:
       crash, ram]
    4: move violently as through a barrier; "The terrorists crashed
       the gate"
    5: break violently or noisily; smash; [syn: crash, break up,
       break apart]
    6: occupy, usually uninvited; "My son's friends crashed our
       house last weekend"
    7: make a sudden loud sound; "the waves crashed on the shore and
       kept us awake all night"
    8: enter uninvited; informal; "let's crash the party!" [syn:
       barge in, crash, gate-crash]
    9: cause to crash; "The terrorists crashed the plane into the
       palace"; "Mother crashed the motorbike into the lamppost"
    10: hurl or thrust violently; "He dashed the plate against the
        wall"; "Waves were dashing against the rock" [syn: crash,
        dash]
    11: undergo a sudden and severe downturn; "the economy crashed";
        "will the stock market crash again?"
    12: stop operating; "My computer crashed last night"; "The
        system goes down at least once a week" [syn: crash, go
        down]
    13: sleep in a convenient place; "You can crash here, though
        it's not very comfortable" [syn: doss, doss down,
        crash]

Moby Thesaurus II by Grady Ward, 1.0:

404 Moby Thesaurus words for "crash":
   Waterloo, a habit, accident, acquired tolerance, acute alcoholism,
   addictedness, addiction, alcoholism,
   amphetamine withdrawal symptoms, appulse, atomize, awake the dead,
   bang, bang into, bankruptcy, barbiturate addiction, barbiturism,
   barge in, be poised, be ruined, bear market, bearish market,
   beating, become insolvent, billow, blast, blast the ear, blow,
   boom, bouncing check, break, break in, break in upon,
   break into pieces, break to pieces, break up, breakdown,
   breaking up, breakup, brunt, bulldozing, bulling, bump, bump into,
   burst, burst in, bust, butt in, calamity, cannon, carambole, carom,
   carom into, cascade, casualty, catabasis, cataclysm, cataract,
   catastrophe, cave, cave-in, chain smoking, charge in,
   chronic alcoholism, chute, clap, clash, cocainism, collapse,
   collide, collision, comb, come between, come down,
   come into collision, comedown, concuss, concussion,
   confront each other, conquering, conquest, contretemps, crack,
   crack up, crack-up, crash in, crash into, crash the gates, craving,
   crawl in, creep in, crescendo, cropper, crowd in, crump, crunch,
   crush, cut in, cut to pieces, dash, dash into, deafen, deathblow,
   debacle, deceleration, declension, declination, decline,
   decline and fall, declining market, decrescendo, defeat, deflation,
   defluxion, demolish, dependence, descend, descending, descension,
   descent, destruction, diffuse, diminuendo, din, dip down,
   dipsomania, disaster, disperse, disrupt, dive, doss down, down,
   downbend, downcome, downcurve, downfall, downflow, downgrade,
   downpour, downrush, downtrend, downturn, downward trend, drive,
   drop, drop down, drop off, dropping, drubbing, drug addiction,
   drug culture, drug dependence, dwindling, ebb, ebb and flow,
   edge in, elbow in, encounter, encroach, entrench, explode,
   explosion, fail, failure, fall, fall dead, fall down, fall flat,
   fall foul of, fall in, fall off, fall short, fall stillborn,
   fall through, falling, fill the air, fission, flap, flop, foist in,
   fold, fold up, force, foul, fragment, go bankrupt, go broke,
   go down, go downhill, go into receivership, go to pot, go to smash,
   go under, go up, gravitate, gravitation, grief, grind, habituation,
   hammering, heave, hiding, hit, hit against, hit the hay,
   hit the sack, horn in, hurt, hurtle, ill hap, impact, impinge,
   impingement, impose, impose on, impose upon, inclination,
   infiltrate, infringe, insinuate, insolvency, insufficient funds,
   interfere, interlope, interpose, intervene, intrude, invade,
   irrupt, jar, jolt, kip down, kited check, knock, knock against,
   lambasting, lapse, lathering, licking, lift, lose altitude,
   make mincemeat of, mastery, mauling, meet, meeting, mince,
   misadventure, mischance, misfortune, mishap, nasty blow, near-miss,
   nicotine addiction, nose dive, obtrude, off market, onslaught,
   overcoming, overdraft, overdrawn account, overthrow, overturn,
   parachute, peak, peal, percuss, percussion, physical dependence,
   pileup, pitch, plummet, plummeting, plunge, popple, pounce,
   pour down, pratfall, precipitate, press in,
   psychological dependence, pulverize, push in, put on, put upon,
   quietus, rain, ramming, rap, rapids, rattle the windows,
   receivership, remission, rend the air, rend the ears, report,
   resound, retreat, retreating market, ring, rise, rise and fall,
   rock the sky, roll, ruin, run, run into, rush in, sack out,
   sack up, sag, sagging market, scatter, scend, send, shatter,
   shipwreck, shiver, shock, shut down, sideswipe, slam, slam into,
   slap, slat, sledgehammering, slink in, slip in, slowdown, slump,
   smack, smack into, smash, smash in, smash into, smash up, smash-up,
   smashing, smashup, sneak in, soft market, splat, splinter,
   split the eardrums, split the ears, squash, squeeze in, squish,
   staggering blow, startle the echoes, steal in, stoop, storm in,
   strike, strike against, stumble, stun, subdual, subduing,
   subjugation, subsidence, surge, swap, swell, swoop, tailspin, tap,
   thrashing, throng in, thrust in, thrusting, thunder, thwack,
   tolerance, topple, toss, total loss, tragedy, trench,
   trend downward, trespass, trimming, trouncing, tumble, turn in,
   undoing, undulate, vanquishment, wane, washout, waterfall, wave,
   whack, wham, whap, whipping, whomp, whop, withdrawal sickness,
   withdrawal symptoms, work in, worm in, wrack, wreck



The Jargon File (version 4.4.7, 29 Dec 2003):

crash


    1. n. A sudden, usually drastic failure. Most often said of the system
    (q.v., sense 1), esp. of magnetic disk drives (the term originally
    described what happens when the air gap of a hard disk collapses). ?Three 
    lusers lost their files in last night's disk crash.? A disk crash that
    involves the read/write heads dropping onto the surface of the disks and
    scraping off the oxide may also be referred to as a head crash, whereas the
    term system crash usually, though not always, implies that the operating
    system or other software was at fault.

    2. v. To fail suddenly. ?Has the system just crashed?? ?Something crashed
    the OS!? See down. Also used transitively to indicate the cause of the
    crash (usually a person or a program, or both). ?Those idiots playing 
    SPACEWAR crashed the system.?

    3. vi. Sometimes said of people hitting the sack after a long hacking run
    ; see gronk out.


The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):

crash

   1. A sudden, usually drastic failure.  Most often said of the
   system, especially of magnetic disk drives (the term
   originally described what happened when the air gap of a hard
   disk collapses).  "Three lusers lost their files in last
   night's disk crash."  A disk crash that involves the
   read/write heads dropping onto the surface of the disks and
   scraping off the oxide may also be referred to as a "head
   crash", whereas the term "system crash" usually, though not
   always, implies that the operating system or other software
   was at fault.

   2. To fail suddenly.  "Has the system just crashed?"
   "Something crashed the OS!" See down.  Also used
   transitively to indicate the cause of the crash (usually a
   person or a program, or both).  "Those idiots playing
   SPACEWAR crashed the system."

   [Jargon File]

   (1994-12-01)