debacle
n. countablen. a complete failure or a situation that is a total mess. It is often used when something that was supposed to be successful goes very wrong in an embarrassing way.
n. a sudden and humiliating failure or downfall, especially of a public undertaking. Often carries connotations of disorder, ridicule, or scandal.
The product launch was a complete debacle.
The political campaign descended into a debacle after the candidate's email leaked to the press.
Investors lost millions in the financial debacle that followed the company's premature expansion into international markets without sufficient research.
From French débâcle, from débâcler (“to unbar; unleash”) from prefix dé- (“un-”) + bâcler (“to dash, bind, bar, block”) [perhaps from unattested Middle French and Old French bâcler, bacler (“to hold in place, prop a door or window open”)], from Vulgar Latin bacculare, from Latin baculum (“rod, staff used for support”), from Proto-Indo-European bak-. Also attested in Old French desbacler (“to clear a harbour by getting ships unloaded to make room for incoming ships with lading”) and in Occitan baclar (“to close”). The hypothesised derivation from Middle Dutch bakkelen (“to freeze artificially, lock in place”), a frequentative of bakken (“to stick, stick hard, glue together”) no longer seems likely due to the lack of attestation of bakkelen in Middle Dutch and by it having the limited meaning of "freeze superficially" in Dutch.