From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishquicksandquick‧sand /ˈkwɪksænd/ noun [countable, uncountable] 1 DNwet sand that is dangerous because you sink down into it if you try to walk on it2 a bad situation that keeps getting worse, and that you cannot escape from
Examples from the Corpus
quicksand• Even readers whose knowledge of the written word comes from cereal boxes are familiar with metaphors using battlefields and quicksand.• She felt a bit like some one caught in quicksand, whose every turn only succeeded in further compounding the difficulties.• Gilbert's squirming body vanished into the carpet like quicksand.• The blackness was suddenly all around, closing in like quicksand.• It was like trying to shore up a wall of quicksand.• The lock had been built on quicksand, and gave continual trouble as the ground subsided and water seeped away. 