Other forms: cascades, cascading, cascaded
A cascade is a small waterfall, or a run of them one after another. Water dropping over rock in steps.
The word suits anything that falls in that stepped, spilling way, so hair can cascade over a shoulder and flowers can cascade from a basket. The figurative sense is about consequences, and a cascade of failures is one thing bringing down the next. Computing and biology both use it precisely for chains of that kind. As a verb it means to fall in this manner, and organisations talk of cascading information down through the ranks.
A cascade is a falling. Italian cascare, to fall, goes back to Latin cadō, the same cadō standing behind case and occasion, except that here it is water doing the falling.
Proto-Indo-European
*ḱh₂d-
Latin
cadō
Vulgar Latin
*cāsicāre
Italian
cascata
French
cascade
English, today
cascade
Built from
From French cascade, from Italian cascata, from cascare (“to fall”), from Vulgar Latin cāsicāre, derived from Latin cadō, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European ḱh₂d-.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA