go for a Burton meet with disaster; be ruined, destroyed, or killed. British informal

☞ This phrase first appeared in mid-20th- century air force slang, meaning 'be killed in a crash'. It has been suggested that it refers to Burton's, the British men's outfitters, or to Burton, a kind of ale, but these are folk etymologies with no definite evidence to support them, and the origin of the phrase remains uncertain.