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airborne

adj

Etymology

Attested since the 1640s; air + -borne

  1. derived from ἀήρ
  2. derived from āēr
  3. derived from air
  4. inherited from aire
  5. suffixed as airborne — “air + borne”

Definitions

  1. In or carried by the air.

    • Airborne pollen can aggravate allergies.
    • A farmer could place an order for a new tractor part by text message and pay for it by mobile money-transfer. A supplier many miles away would then take the part to the local matternet station for airborne dispatch via drone.

  2. In flight.

    • There goes the siren that warns of the air raid / Then comes the sound of the guns sending flak / Out for the scramble we've got to get airborne / Got to get up for the coming attack.

  3. Fitted to an aircraft.

    • airborne radar
  4. ›+ 2 more definitions

    1. Transported by air in an aircraft.

      • airborne troops

    2. Military infantry intended to be transported by air and delivered to the battlefield by…

      Military infantry intended to be transported by air and delivered to the battlefield by parachute or helicopter.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at airborne. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01airborne02flight03swallows04swallow05taken06infatuated07unreasoningly08reasoning09thought10smell

A definitional loop anchored at airborne. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

10 hops · closes at airborne

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA