How to Use booby trap in a Sentence

booby trap

noun
  • Someone had rigged a booby trap that blew up the car when the engine was started.
  • We set a booby trap by balancing a bucket of water on top of the door so that it would fall on him when he came in.
  • For a novice member of the field, the coolest details of the event doubled as booby traps.
    — Gabby Herzig, New York Times, 9 Oct. 2025
  • Specialized teams were called to the scene to defuse booby traps in the building, police said.
    — FOXNews.com, 1 Oct. 2025
  • Specialized teams were called to the scene to defuse booby traps in the residential building, city police said.
    — CNN Money, 1 Oct. 2025
  • While claims of booby traps and rivers of mercury would likely make anyone think twice about entering the tomb, this is not the main barrier to full excavation.
    — Christopher McFadden, Interesting Engineering, 25 Dec. 2025
  • The gauntlet of booby traps culminating in the giant boulder that kick off Raiders is my single favorite opening sequence in a movie ever.
    — Chris Nashawaty, Entertainment Weekly, 13 June 2026
  • In the days leading up to the attack, Ghazali allegedly rigged his truck with booby traps, fireworks, explosives, and large amounts of gasoline.
    — Bonny Chu, FOXNews.com, 30 Mar. 2026
  • The movie’s biggest laughs come from Kevin’s hijinks, which involve setting up complex booby traps to fend off a pair of burglars targeting his family’s home.
    — Shirley Li, The Atlantic, 30 Jan. 2026
  • The Duffers add that one of the key inspirations for this season is Home Alone—specifically the booby traps.
    — Eliana Dockterman, Time, 16 Oct. 2025
  • In the original Home Alone, Kevin is forced to defend him home from two bumbling burglars by setting various booby traps around the house.
    — Mitchell Peters, Billboard, 21 Dec. 2025
  • Left to fend for himself in Chicago, Kevin gets into hijinks, including elaborate booby traps to fend off a pair of intruders who try to rob his home.
    — Francesca Gariano, PEOPLE, 21 Dec. 2025
  • These may show up in Ukraine before long, perhaps walking ahead of patrols to find booby traps and clear routes through minefields, or taking bullets to expose enemy firing position.
    — David Hambling, Forbes.com, 2 Sep. 2025
  • Their 2025-26 season has been littered with injury landmines and other booby traps hidden in the walls of Ball Arena.
    — Bennett Durando, Denver Post, 30 Jan. 2026
  • Colonial militias attempted periodic raids, but historical records report that they were met with rugged terrain, booby traps and counterattacks.
    — Justin Dunnavant, The Conversation, 27 Aug. 2025
  • Picture Indiana Jones swapping his fedora for a Han dynasty helmet, dodging booby traps in dusty Chinese tombs.
    — Urnesha Bhattacherjee, Encyclopedia Britannica, 27 Apr. 2026
  • Deputies said during the initial call that neighbors had reported gunshots being fired and that a second caller, who claimed to have fired the gun, had placed booby traps around a home in the Kavala Ranch development.
    — Graham Womack, Sacbee.com, 27 Jan. 2026
  • When two bumbling thieves (Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern) attempt to rob his home, Kevin begins an elaborately violent, slapstick battle of wits via booby traps involving a tarantula, paint buckets, and flamethrowers.
    — Chris Snellgrove, Entertainment Weekly, 26 Dec. 2025

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'booby trap.' 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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