How to Use devastate in a Sentence

devastate

verb

• The flood devastated the town.
• The disease has devastated the area's oak tree population.
• The hurricane left the island completely devastated.
• Hashem was devastated to the point of backing out of the deal.
  — Nate Jackson, Los Angeles Times, 8 June 2023
• Coltrane’s death, in 1967, at the age of forty, devastated the music world.
  — Hua Hsu carlos Chavarría, The New Yorker, 24 Dec. 2019
• In the treeless Aleutians, rats can devastate birds that nest on the ground.
  — Morgan Krakow, Anchorage Daily News, 28 Nov. 2021
• Fueled by substance abuse, the muse will devastate the vessel and wound the soul.
  — Ew Staff, EW.com, 11 Aug. 2020
• Climate change is a real threat to the species as the loss of sea ice will devastate their habitats.
  — Lianne Kolirin, CNN, 5 Aug. 2020
• Their rental house, in South Lake Tahoe, backed up to the forest that had been devastated by the wildfire in 2021.
  — Paige Williams, The New Yorker, 25 Nov. 2024
• The part of the island which includes the historic town Lahaina was devastated by the fires.
  — Analisa Novak, CBS News, 19 Sep. 2023
• Jackson said she is still devastated over the loss of her youngest son.
  — Kelly Davis, The Mercury News, 4 Nov. 2024
• The Coquette’s jealousy leads the Baron, the host of the ball, to stab the Poet; the Sleepwalker, devastated, carries him away.
  — Gia Kourlas, New York Times, 3 Oct. 2023
• The fact of the matter is Lindsay is devastated and I'm crushed with how all this transpired.
  — Bailey Richards, Peoplemag, 9 Nov. 2023
• This week marks three months of war that continues to devastate Gaza as the bodies and rubble pile up in the wake of the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre.
  — TIME, 11 Jan. 2024
• The disease can devastate an entire coral colony in only a few weeks to months.
  — Laura Baisas, Popular Science, 5 June 2025
• Frankenstein the novel is about many things, including the life of the mind and how the human heart divides and devastates us.
  — Mikal Gilmore, Rolling Stone, 31 Oct. 2023
• Both Israel and Hezbollah have sought to avoid a war that could devastate Lebanon and Israel.
  — Arkansas Online, 5 Aug. 2020
• The fires that devastated the Amazon in the summer of 2019 were no accident.
  — CBS News, 27 Feb. 2020
• No one's talking at this point, but I am devastated by this news.
  — Katherine J Igoe, Marie Claire, 10 Dec. 2019
• And deluges and floods devastated areas around the world.
  — Tom Yulsman, Discover Magazine, 29 Jan. 2024
• He was devastated but didn’t know what else to do other than accept they were lost and move on.
  — Jonathan Edwards, Washington Post, 6 Nov. 2023
• On May 13, we were devastated to hear that the royal family of the Netherlands had sailed to Britain.
  — Smithsonian Magazine, 15 May 2023
• So, when Garcia received the news from the vet in June that Nala had cancer, she was devastated.
  — Jordan Greene, Peoplemag, 13 Aug. 2024
• Coal plants can be the largest employer in a region, and plant closures can devastate the towns and counties that host them.
  — Ryan Randazzo, The Arizona Republic, 8 Oct. 2022
• More than a decade later, fans of the wildly popular group were devastated to learn of the death of Liam Payne last week at age 31.
  — Katie Atkinson, Billboard, 22 Oct. 2024
• This leaves the band’s fans devastated, including a young boy named Sea (played by Chang).
  — Sara Merican, Deadline, 7 Aug. 2024
• The death shook the Philly music scene and devastated Nowell’s friends and bandmates, many of whom struggle to talk about their friend.
  — Tyler Hicks, Rolling Stone, 5 June 2025
• The 29-year-old was just one of the scores of foreigners who became caught up in the attack that has devastated families around the world.
  — Heather Chen, CNN, 13 Oct. 2023
• The National Weather Service has issued a flood watch for south central Texas, a week after the area was devastated by deadly flash floods.
  — Alexis Simmerman, Austin American Statesman, 12 July 2025
• The majority of the deaths were in Kerr County, where a torrential downpour flooded the Guadalupe River and devastated a girls’ summer camp.
  — Zachary Folk, Forbes.com, 13 July 2025