A snowball's chance in hell
Meaning
This phrase describes an extremely slim or non-existent possibility of something happening.
Origin
Imagine the fiery, brimstone landscape of hell. Now, picture a delicate, freezing snowball tossed into that inferno. The outcome is not just certain, it's comically, instantaneously catastrophic. This vivid, almost cartoonish image of utter annihilation is precisely what gives 'a snowball's chance in hell' its punch. While its exact birth is lost to time, this idiom rose to prominence in the informal, spirited language of 20th-century America, quickly becoming a favored, darkly humorous way to declare something utterly impossible, a fate sealed by the sheer absurdity of the comparison.
Examples
- That struggling team has a snowball's chance in hell of winning the championship this year.
- He thinks he can finish the entire project in an hour, but he's got a snowball's chance in hell of actually doing it.