How to Use fateful in a Sentence

fateful

adjective
  • Her campaign took a fateful turn.
  • Hundreds perished on that fateful day.
  • His life changed on that fateful November evening.
  • At worst, this could be the start of a fateful tailspin.
    — Adam Himmelsbach, BostonGlobe.com, 8 May 2023
  • When the fateful night came, Jeanne hid in the bushes and watched.
    — Tori Telfer, refinery29.com, 24 Feb. 2021
  • Yet in that fateful 26-game stretch, the Mets were outscored by just 11 runs.
    — Gabe Lacques, USA TODAY, 7 Aug. 2023
  • This is about the non-yield since the Sox went out of their way to lock him up in that fateful spring.
    — Dan Shaughnessy, BostonGlobe.com, 1 Apr. 2023
  • And on that fateful day when the snail’s life ends, the rest of the trematode’s life begins.
    — Sabrina Imbler, The Atlantic, 16 Feb. 2021
  • This morning, Christopher stood at the end of the board, took a breath and made the fateful hop.
    — New York Times, 4 July 2022
  • The song then took on a whole new meaning for the Ting Tings on a fateful trip to Spain.
    — Mike Wass, Variety, 14 Feb. 2022
  • Then, a few months later, a fateful storm hit the city.
    — Megha McSwain, Chron, 8 Aug. 2022
  • Go back to the scene of that fateful meeting and propose at the very same place.
    — Alesandra Dubin, Good Housekeeping, 22 Jan. 2021
  • Then came that fateful meeting with Gaye at the Hoover Street Gym in 1978.
    — Matthew Allan, Rolling Stone, 4 Feb. 2023
  • But art might not have been her path if not for a fateful tragedy in her mid-20s.
    — New York Times, 1 Mar. 2021
  • Yet there was one more fateful roll of the many-sided die.
    — Elizabeth Hand, Washington Post, 26 Aug. 2022
  • Kat Tarnowski, who was on the scene that fateful night.
    — San Diego Union-Tribune, 19 Apr. 2021
  • Biden showed up to a fateful debate and so should Trump.
    — New York Daily News Editorial Board, New York Daily News, 28 July 2024
  • The fateful loss last season occurred on May 15, almost a year to the day of this one.
    — Tyler Dragon, USA TODAY, 12 May 2023
  • Holder was in the room with Pike and police on that fateful day.
    — Pj Green, Kansas City Star, 25 Feb. 2025
  • Which brings us to that fateful Thursday night in 2002.
    — Washington Post, 4 May 2022
  • Then one fateful night in August, Ernestine and I are about to go to bed.
    — Brianne Tracy, Peoplemag, 1 Nov. 2023
  • That was where Zahawi stayed, until the fateful events of the 2022 summer.
    — Robert Goulder, Forbes, 13 Feb. 2023
  • Needless to say, the witch schemes to reach Snow first, fateful apple in hand.
    — Dennis Harvey, Variety, 2 May 2025
  • Most of the high points of the Nagy era came before Parkey’s fateful kick nailed the upright and then bounced off the crossbar.
    — Brad Biggs, Chicago Tribune, 14 Oct. 2024
  • And then came those fateful six weeks, a stretch of poor play that the Twins vowed to never repeat.
    — Betsy Helfand, Twin Cities, 26 Mar. 2025
  • Having landed in London, the ladies hear that fateful knock on the door.
    — Kristen Baldwin, EW.com, 17 Feb. 2023
  • But when two friends sat down for a fateful meal in Tokyo, a big idea hit like a hearty dollop of wasabi.
    — Bill Plaschke, Los Angeles Times, 4 May 2023
  • That means some heads are going to roll at the fateful senior prom.
    — Steven Thrash, EW.com, 27 Oct. 2022
  • Her flippant attitude toward school, her refusal to talk through her grief, and her slippery grasp on the concepts of right and wrong can all be traced to that fateful night in this garage.
    — Stacia Brown, Vulture, 25 June 2025
  • Anna Werner looks back at a fateful string of shark encounters a hundred years ago that stirred the public imagination.
    — David Morgan, CBS News, 20 June 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'fateful.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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