turntable

In order to transfer an engine or carriage laterally to another line of rails, at a station or terminus, circular platforms called turntables are established upon each set of rails, which turn as upon a pivot in the centre of each line, each contiguous pair of tables being connected by short branch rails, standing at right angles to the line of rails. The engine or carriage to be transferred is brought to rest wholly upon one table, which is then turned a quarter round, and the carriage is then wheeled on to the next turntable, which being likewise turned a quarter round, the engine or carriage will then be in a position to proceed on the line to which the second table appertains.

1846, Luke Hebert, The Engineer’s and Mechanic’s Encyclopædia, […]. In Two Volumes, volume II, London: Thomas Kelly, […], →OCLC, page 432:

Of locomotive interest was "an engine house for spare engines which was about 60 ft. × 51 ft.; on the outside of this was an immense turntable sufficient to turn the engine and tender at once."

1944 July and August, Reginald B. Fellows, “The Failure of Bricklayers Arms as a Passenger Station—I”, in Railway Magazine, page 211:

The domestic coal depot at St Pancras, north of Somers Town Goods. The numerous transverse sidings, into which full wagons were placed for unloading, were served by more than a dozen small wagon turntables from a central spine siding, with shunting by horses or possibly capstans and cables.

2021 December 1, Nigel Harris, “St Pancras and King's Cross: 1947”, in RAIL, number 945, page 43, photo caption:

(rail transport, road transport) A rotating platform placed in a circular pit, used for turning locomotives, cars, or trucks.

točna

rotating platform for turning locomotives

kääntötaso

rotating platform for turning cars and trucks


diff

This diff is capable of locking up when wheel slip occurs.

Many operators cursed the early diff and driveline set-ups[.]

2000, Bob Foster, Birdum or Bust!, Henley Beach, SA: Seaview Press, page 45:

(automotive) Abbreviation of differential: the differential gear in an automobile.


autopilot

en-noun

autopilot (countable and uncountable, plural autopilots)

I set the autopilot to due south, so I could get some rest.

(aviation, nautical) A mechanical, electrical, or hydraulic system used to guide a vehicle without assistance from a human being.


red flag

(rail transport, UK) A flag formerly used by a railway guard to warn the driver not to start the train.


head to wind

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-head to wind.wav

(nautical) Having the bow of a boat facing directly into the wind


demurrage

demurrage (countable and uncountable, plural demurrages)

despatch

antonym(s) of “detention of a ship, or fee paid for it”

1640s, from Old French demorage, from demorer (English demur), from Latin dēmorārī (“to tarry”).
By surface analysis, demur (“delay”) + -age, with doubled ‘r’ to clarify pronunciation and avoid ambiguity with demure.

surf

(shipping) the detention of a ship or other freight vehicle, during delayed loading or unloading

surestarie

detention of a freight vehicle during delayed loading or unloading


Jubilee

See jubilee. The proper noun sense (“London Underground line”) was named after the silver jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom (born 1926) in 1977.

(rail transport) A London Underground line which runs between Stratford in East London and Stanmore in northwest London, via the London Docklands, South Bank, and West End.


Jonah

From the Hebrew יוֹנָה (yonáh, “dove”). Doublet of Jonas.

Superstitious sailors regarded a clergyman as an unlucky shipmate, a Jonah whose presence would never be welcome.

2008, Richard Blake, Evangelicals in the Royal Navy, 1775-1815: Blue Lights & Psalm-singers:

(nautical, slang) A person who brings a ship bad luck.


docking

From Middle English dockyng. By surface analysis, dock + -ing.

(nautical) The securing of a vessel to the quayside with cables.


lightship

From light (noun) + ship (noun). Cognate with Middle Low German lüchteschip (“lightship”), Dutch lichtschip (“lightship”).

cog

(nautical) A vessel riding at anchor and displaying a light for the guidance of sailors, in a position where a fixed lighthouse structure would be impracticable.


DMS

en-noun

DMS (countable and uncountable, plural DMSs)

driver monitoring system
w:driver monitoring system

(uncountable, automotive) Initialism of driver monitoring system.


landsman

From land + -s- + man. In meanings 3 and 4, influenced by Yiddish לאַנדסמאַן (landsman). Compare also German Landsmann, Norwegian landsmann. Doublet of lantzman.

(obsolete, nautical) A military rank given to naval recruits


anchorman

From anchor + man. Senses 1 and 4 derive from sense 2, sense 3 is literal.

(nautical) The person on a ship in charge of the anchor.

ankkurimies

nautical: person in charge of the anchor


viol

Borrowed from Middle French viole, from Old French viol, from Old Occitan viola (modern Occitan viula), from Medieval Latin vitula (“stringed instrument”). Doublet of viola.

der

(nautical) A large rope used to manipulate the anchor


chemical horn

(nautical) a horn on a floating mine which, upon contact, releases an electrolyte that makes an electrical connection and initiates the explosion


no man's land

Originally from Middle English Nomanneslond, which first appears c. 1350. Revived with new senses in a dispatch printed in the Times newspaper by Colonel Ernest Dunlop Swinton writing as "Eyewitness".

(nautical) A space amidships used to keep blocks, ropes, etc.; a space on a ship belonging to no one in particular for which to care.


crutch

From Middle English crucche, from Old English cryċċ (“crutch, staff”), from Proto-West Germanic *krukkju, from Proto-Germanic *krukjō (“crutch, staff”), from Proto-Indo-European *grewg- (“wrinkle, bend”), from Proto-Indo-European *ger- (“to turn, bend”).
Cognate with Scots curche, crutch (“crutch, stilts”), Dutch kruk (“crutch”), Low German krukke, Krück (“crutch”), German Krücke (“crutch”), Swedish krycka (“crutch”). Latin crucia, crucca, croccia, crocia (“crutch”), and its descendants are ultimately from the Germanic.

der

could eat the crutch from a low flying duck

(nautical) A knee, or piece of knee timber.

(nautical) A forked stanchion or post; a crotch.


oldster

From old + -ster, modelled after youngster.

(nautical) A midshipman of four years' standing; a master's mate.


spanking

From spank (“to move energetically”) + -ing.

a spanking breeze


timenoguy

Probably ultimately based on Old French Old French timon (“tiller”) + English guy.

But there is nothing so tedious as sitting by when two old shipmates are calling out, ‘Do you remember the three days’ blow in the Mona Passage? – Do you remember Wilkins and his timenoguy?’

(nautical) A rope used on a ship to prevent other lines and riggings tangling with each other.


magnetohydrodynamics

(nautical, engineering) the study of the interaction of water with magnetic fields and its application


RT

en-noun

RT (countable and uncountable, plural RTs)


logbook

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-logbook.wav

1670s, log + book, originally a record of a ship’s speed and progress, from a wooden float (chip log, or simply log) used to measure speed.

корабен дневник

nautical: book in which details from journey are recorded

(nautical) A book in which measurements from the ship's log are recorded, along with other salient details of the voyage.


scuttlebutt

scuttlebutt (countable and uncountable, plural scuttlebutts)

The noun is derived from scuttle (“to cut a hole through (something)”) + butt (“wooden cask”). Sense 2 (“gossip, idle chatter; rumour”) refers to the fact that sailors would gather around the scuttlebutt to drink and exchange gossip; compare furphy and water cooler.
The verb is derived from the noun.

compound

[S]o they continue to fire as directed, until they are either sent down to the cock-pit themselves, or have a momentary respite from their exertions, when, choaked with smoke and gunpowder, they go aft to the scuttle-butt, to remove their parching thirst.

1830, [Frederick Marryat], chapter VIII, in The King’s Own. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn and Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, pages 93–94:

In this way, with an occasional break by relieving the wheel, heaving the log, and going to the scuttle-butt for a drink of water, the longest watch was passed away; […]

1840, R[ichard] H[enry] D[ana], Jr., chapter XXXII, in Two Years before the Mast. […] (Harper’s Family Library; no. CVI), New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers […], →OCLC, page 407:

The scuttle-butt is a goodly, round, painted cask, standing on end, and with its upper head removed, showing a narrow circular shelf within, where rest a number of tin cups for the accommodation of drinkers. Central, within the scuttle-butt itself, stands an iron pump, which, connecting with the immense water-tanks in the hold, furnishes an unfailing supply of the much-admired Pale Ale, first brewed in the brooks of the Garden of Eden, and stamped with the brand of our old father Adam, who never knew what wine was.

1850, Herman Melville, “A Man-of-War Fountain, and Other Things”, in White-Jacket; or, The World in a Man-of-War, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers; London: Richard Bentley, published 1855, →OCLC, page 332:

It was the middle-watch: a fair moonlight; the seamen were standing in a cordon, extending from one of the fresh-water butts in the waist, to the scuttle-butt near the taffrail. In this manner, they passed the buckets to fill the scuttle-butt.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “Hark!”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 217:

[T]he scuttle-butts are on the starboard side of the galley. You will find a bottle on one of them that will serve as a dipper. Drink moderately, for your life's sake, and get a pannikin from the galley and bring it aft, filled.

1880, W[illiam] Clark Russell, “The Survivors of the ‘Waldershare’”, in A Sailor’s Sweetheart. […], volume II, London: Sampson Low, Searle & Rivington, […], →OCLC, pages 273–274:

When the eight new tankers of the Standard Oil Company of New Jersey start on their coastwise service, their crews will be assured of the proper preservation of their perishable foods. Carrier refrigerating systems will provide for the 1220 ft.³ refrigerator, chill room of 890 ft.³, and the scuttle butt with storage capacity of 40 gal. of drinking water.

1936 October, “Eight Tankers Equipped with Modern Facilities for Food Preservation”, in Refrigerating Engineering: Economic Application of Air Conditioning and Refrigeration, volume 32, number 4, New York, N.Y.: American Society of Refrigerating Engineers, →OCLC, page 285, column 1:

Leaning over the scuttlebutt one afternoon, Bond suddenly realized he'd been gulping water for maybe a minute. […] The rest of the afternoon, all that night, and all the next day, his thirst was unquenchable. […] During the night he woke many times, his throat parched and burning, to crawl out of his sack and rush to the scuttlebutt for water.

1986, John Wheatcroft, Slow Exposures, Cranbury, N.J., London: Cornwall Books, →ISBN, page 114:

During the midwatch a radioman striker (that is, a seaman trying to advance to radioman third class) was taking a drink of water from the third-deck scuttlebutt.

1991, Paul Stillwell, “The Tranquil Twenties: August 1921 – May 1929”, in Battleship Arizona: An Illustrated History, Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, →ISBN, page 79, column 1:

We all grabbed towels that belonged to whoever lived there, and we wet them down in the scuttlebutt and wrapped them around our faces to filter out as much smoke as possible.

2007, Joseph A[dam] Springer, Inferno: The Epic Life and Death Struggle of the USS Franklin in World War II, St. Paul, Minn.: Zenith Press, →ISBN, page 218:

(countable, nautical) Originally (now chiefly historical), a cask with a hole cut into its top, used to provide drinking water on board a ship; now (by extension, informal), a drinking fountain on a modern ship.

бъчва с вода за пиене

"That's the scuttlebutt," Bronson said defiantly. "You got some pet coolie down there you want to put in Chien's place." / "Who told you that?" / "It's just scuttlebutt." / "Scuttlebutt travels on words." Holman's voice was shaking. "You tell me one man you heard say that, or I'll beat your fat face in!"

1962 September, Richard McKenna, chapter 9, in The Sand Pebbles […], New York, N.Y., Evanston, Ill.: Harper & Row, →OCLC, page 137:

His resolve not to worry about unfounded scuttlebutt lasted about two minutes.

2003, Len Custer, Called to Serve: A Historical Novel of the Korean War, New York, N.Y.: iUniverse, →ISBN, page 211:

They were bound this day for the city of Chicago, and the World's Columbian Exposition recently opened there. Since their orders had come through, the "scuttlebutt" among the excited and curious crew had been of little besides the fabled "White City," […]

2006, Thomas Pynchon, “The Light over the Ranges”, in Against the Day, New York, N.Y.: Penguin Press, →ISBN, page 3:

(uncountable, originally US, nautical slang) Gossip, idle chatter; also, rumour.


fishplate

From fish + plate. See fish (“curved wooden bar used to strengthen a ship's mast”).

The train, minus the three abandoned trucks, again proceeded at a slow pace, with a pump trolley doing pilot ahead ; this was very necessary as a great many sleepers were found to have been burnt underneath the fishplates.

1901, George Gipps, The Fighting in North China (up to the Fall of Tientsin City), Shanghai: Kelly and Walsh, →OL, page 40:

(rail transport) A metal bar that is bolted to the ends of two rails to join them together in a track.


fishplate

en-verb

fishplate (third-person singular simple present fishplates, present participle fishplating, simple past and past participle fishplated)

fishplates (present singular third-person)
fishplating (participle present)
fishplated (participle past)
fishplated (past)

One section of the line will consist of 60 ft. lengths of rail welded together on site to form fully continuous rails; another will be of 300 ft. lengths, flash butt-welded in Dinsdale Rail Welding Depot and fishplated together on site; [...].

1959 November, “Talking of Trains: Widening north of York”, in Trains Illustrated, page 518:

(transitive, rail transport) To connect (rails) together using a fishplate.


stopper

The local train was empty at midday. She changed at Yatton and caught a stopper into Bristol. There was an express calling at Exeter which left Bristol at twelve-forty-five and she caught it by the skin of her teeth.

1996, Susan Sallis, Touched by Angels, Random House, page 300:

Changing times at Barnham on December 8 2022. Southern 313211 is an all-stations stopper.

2023 February 22, Howard Johnston, “Southern '313s': is the end now in sight?”, in RAIL, number 977, page 39, photo caption:

(rail transport) A train that calls at all or almost all stations between its origin and destination, including very small ones.

(nautical) A short rope for making something fast.


limber

For the obsolete limmer, from Old Norse limar (“branches”), plural of lim.

(nautical, in the plural) Gutters or conduits on each side of the keelson to allow water to pass to the pump well.


hurdy-gurdy

Probably onomatopoeic in imitation of the sound produced by the stringed instrument. Compare obsolete hirdy-girdy (“an uproar; noise”). Attested from the 1740s.

A pair of oars, a small mast and sail, pen boards to contain the fish, a bailer, a water jar, a bait knife, a compass, a small wooden winch called a hurdy gurdy, a fish gaff, and the tubs, trawls, floats, and anchors used to set gear was all that was required to equip it.

2009, Keith McLaren, A Race for Real Sailors, page 20:


cutlass

From Middle French coutelas, from Old French coutel (“knife”) + -as (augmentative suffix).

She could feel Tern’s stare fixed right between her shoulder blades, and knew he was aching to plunge his cutlass there.

2015 September 1, Sarah J. Maas, Queen of Shadows, →ISBN:

In vain the captain threatened to throw him overboard; suspended a cutlass over his naked wrists; Queequeg was the son of a King, and Queequeg budged not.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter XII, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:

(nautical) A short sword with a curved blade, and a convex edge; once used by sailors when boarding an enemy ship.


skag

en-noun

skag (countable and uncountable, plural skags)


burn out

en-verb

burn out (third-person singular simple present burns out, present participle burning out, simple past and past participle burned out or (mostly Commonwealth) burnt out)

burns out (present singular third-person)
burning out (participle present)
burned out (participle past)
burned out (past)
burnt out (Commonwealth participle past)
burnt out (Commonwealth past)

(intransitive, automotive) To have one's tires skid against the ground; to peel off, peel out.


seaplane

(aircraft, nautical) Any aircraft capable of taking off from, and alighting on the surface of water.


plunderage

(maritime law) The embezzlement of goods on shipboard.


turnbuckle

(nautical) A link threaded on both ends of a short bar which is used to pull objects together. (FM 55-501)


pollywog

(sailing slang) A sailor who has not yet crossed the equator.


skiff

skiff (third-person singular simple present skiffs, present participle skiffing, simple past and past participle skiffed)

skiffs (present singular third-person)
skiffing (participle present)
skiffed (participle past)
skiffed (past)

From Middle English skif, from Middle French esquif, from Old Italian schifo (“small boat”), from Lombardic skif (“boat”), from Proto-Germanic *skipą (“boat, ship”). Doublet of ship.

(nautical, transitive) To navigate in a skiff.


(rail transport) Alternative form of four foot


casco

Borrowed from Spanish casco. Doublet of cask and casque.

(nautical) A flat-bottomed, square-ended boat once used in the Philippines as a lighter to ferry goods between ship and shore


northing

(nautical) A distance traveled northward.


lighterman

1622, Ben Jonson, The Masque of Augurs, The First Antimasque, in The Works of Ben Jonson, London: D. Midwinter et al., 1756, Volume 6, p. 122,
A poor lighterman, sir, one that hath had the honour sometimes to lay in the king’s beer there […]

One Dobson, a lighterman, undertook, for a wager of five guineas, to swim on his back from Westminster bridge to Putney bridge in an hour and three quarters, without turning himself in the water; which he performed 19 minutes within the time.

1766 July, The Annual Register, page 115:

At that the Pool became a scene of mad confusion, fighting, and collision, and for some time a multitude of boats and barges jammed in the northern arch of the Tower Bridge, and the sailors and lightermen had to fight savagely against the people who swarmed upon them from the riverfront.

1898, H. G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, Book One, Chapter 17:

[ Alex Smith ] was a lighterman on the Thames at the time Bligh was signing on the Bounty men, but he hated the business and was only waiting for a suitable opportunity to go to sea again.

1934, Charles Nordhoff, James Norman Hall, chapter 2, in Pitcairn’s Island:

(nautical) One employed on, owning, or managing a lighter.


easting

en-noun

easting (countable and uncountable, plural eastings)

It was very tiring and slow work, yet I did visibly gain ground; and as we drew near the Cape of the Woods, though I saw I must infallibly miss that point, I had still made some hundred yards of easting.

1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC:

(nautical) A distance traveled eastward.


mainsail

(nautical) The largest (or only) sail on a sailing vessel.


pintle

From Middle English pyntel, from Old English pintel (“penis”), from Proto-Germanic *pint- (“protrusion”), from Proto-Indo-European *bend- (“peg, tip, protruding point, edge”), equivalent to pin + -le. Cognate with Middle Low German pint (“male member, penis”), West Flemish pint (“tip”), Norwegian dialectal pintol (“penis”). More at pin, pen.

cog

The train had a searchlight mounted on a pintle on a flat car.

2005, James Meek, The People’s Act of Love, Canongate, published 2006, page 31:

(nautical) A pin or bolt, usually vertical, which acts as a pivot for a hinge or a rudder.


engine room

(nautical) A compartment on a ship in which the engine machinery is located.


railcar

skinnebus

self-propelled railway vehicle similar to a bus

автодрези́на

powered single railway vehicle with driver's cab at both ends

The semi-streamlined contour of the earlier G.W.R. railcars has been given up in favour of a more utilitarian blunt-nose end, and effective floor space gained thereby.

1941 October, “Notes and News: Great Western Parcels Railcar”, in Railway Magazine, page 474:

Profitable operation is being made possible by the widespread introduction of capacious diesel railcars, which for their comfort and speed are very popular with the travelling public.

1953 April, “Reviving U.S.A. Passenger Traffic”, in Railway Magazine, page 218:

(rail transport) A self-propelled railway vehicle for passengers, similar to a bus.

(rail transport) A powered single railway vehicle designed for passenger transport, with a driver's cab in both ends; Not to be confused with motor coach/motorcar, which is a powered railway vehicle capable to haul a train.


left-hander

(automotive) A bend or turn to the left; a left-hand corner.


cherries

(rail transport, British) A rail-gap indicator.


Mexican overdrive

Synchronically, coordinate with other variants of overdrive in this sense of the word, whereas some of the variants certainly denigrate outgroups (e.g., Jewish overdrive, Polish overdrive) and others might not be denigrating but rather celebratory (e.g., Georgia overdrive); diachronically, this one has been said to be based on NASCAR teams' experience in the early 1950s in the legendary Carerra Panamerica, where the long hills would have otherwise overrevved the engines, although this may be a folk etymology for just another outgroup-denigrating variant.

He shifted his car out of gear, at the top of the hill, and coasted down in Mexican overdrive.

(US, slang, automotive) Synonym of angel gear.


longboat

But our Patron, warn’d by this Disaster, resolved to take more Care of himself for the future; and having lying by him the Long-Boat of our English Ship that he had taken, he resolved he would not go a fishing any more without a Compass and some Provision […]

1719 May 6 (Gregorian calendar), [Daniel Defoe], The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, […], London: […] W[illiam] Taylor […], →OCLC:

We cast Anchor within a League of this Creek, and our Captain sent a dozen of his Men well armed in the Long Boat, with Vessels for Water, if any could be found.

1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “A Great Storm Described, the Long-Boat Sent to Fetch Water, the Author Goes with It to Discover the Country. […]”, in Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World. […] [Gulliver’s Travels], volume I, London: […] Benj[amin] Motte, […], →OCLC, part II (A Voyage to Brobdingnag), pages 153–154:

So far we had had reason to rejoice in the escape of our longboat, which had received no damage from any of the huge seas which had come on board.

1838, [Edgar Allan Poe], chapter VIII, in The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket. […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC, page 83:

The longboat, with seven of the crew, was picked up eighteen days after by H. M. gunboat Myrtle, and the story of their terrible privations has become quite as well known as the far more horrible Medusa case.

1896, H[erbert] G[eorge] Wells, chapter I, in The Island of Doctor Moreau (Heinemann’s Colonial Library of Popular Fiction; 52), London: William Heinemann, →OCLC; republished as The Island of Doctor Moreau: A Possibility, New York, N.Y.: Stone & Kimball, 1896, →OCLC:

(nautical) The largest and thus the most capable of boats carried on a ship.


banking

en-noun

banking (countable and uncountable, plural bankings)

On the Dava line, apart from the banking assistance given by the 4-4-0s, the traffic is handled by the standard class "5" 4-6-0s, known among the drivers as "Hikers"; these engines are shedded at Inverness and Perth.

1944 January and February, W. McGowan Gradon, “Forres as a Railway Centre”, in Railway Magazine, page 23:

(rail transport) The practice of assisting a train up a steep incline (called a bank) with another locomotive at the rear.

подта́лкивание

rail transport: helping a train up a steep incline


logline

First attested in 1613 as logge-line. A compound of log + line.

Besides the ingenious Pilot knowing the elevation of the Pole in some places of his voyage that he hath passed, by keeping a true, not a dead reckoning of his course in pricking his Card aright, and observing the way with the logge-line, with other currants, will give a very artificiall conjecture of the elevation of the pole in that place where he is, though he sec neither Sunne nor Starres.

1613, Mark Ridley, A Short Treatise of Magneticall Bodies and Motions:

Bring the ship to rights, that is, againe under saile as she was, some use a Log line, and a minute glasse to know what way shee makes, but that is so uncertaine, it is not worth the labour to trie it.

1627, John Smith, A sea grammar with the plaine exposition of Smiths Accidence for young sea-men, enlarged:

The 120th part of that Mile is 41⅔ feet, and so much is the space betweene the Knots upon the Log-line: So many Knots as the ship runs in half a minute, so many Miles she sayleth in an hour; or so many Leagues, and so many Miles she runneth in a Watch or four hours, called A Watch, because one half of the Ships Company watcheth by turns, and changes every four hours.

1659, John Collins, Navigation by the Mariners Plain Scale New Plain'd:

(nautical) The line fastened to the log, and marked for finding the speed of a vessel.


nao

I got vivid descriptions of the sea battle at Chaul from the Mamluk sailors and the Ottoman gunners so that I could clearly visualise the Mamluk galleys and the Ottoman guns battling the Portuguese naos at the entrance of the Kundalika river.

2007, Eusebio L. Rodrigues, Love and Samsāra:

(nautical, historical, rare) A Spanish or Portuguese carrack.


drunk driving

(law, automotive, US) The act of driving under the influence of alcohol.

Specifically, the criminal offence of driving with a blood alcohol content (BAC) level higher than the local legal limit.


normalize

en-verb

normalize (third-person singular simple present normalizes, present participle normalizing, simple past and past participle normalized)

normalizes (present singular third-person)
normalizing (participle present)
normalized (participle past)
normalized (past)

palauttaa

rail transport, transitive: to return to the normal position

palautua

rail transport, intransitive: to return to the normal position

(rail transport, transitive) To return a set of points (switches) to the normal position.

(rail transport, intransitive, of points) To return to the normal position from the reverse position.


bakkie

Borrowed from Afrikaans bakkie, and then either:
* from Northern Dutch bakkie (informal), from Dutch bakje (“container; drinking vessel; (archaic) carriage for passengers”), from bak (“container; drinking vessel; vehicle; part of a vehicle for carrying loads; part of a carriage for carrying passengers”) (see further at that entry) + -je (diminutive suffix); or
* from Afrikaans bak (“container; part of a vehicle for carrying loads”) (from Dutch bak; see above) + -ie (diminutive suffix).

der

(road transport) A small pick-up truck or ute, generally open and sometimes fitted with a removable canopy, but distinct from an enclosed van and a large truck.


hydroplane

en-verb

hydroplane (third-person singular simple present hydroplanes, present participle hydroplaning, simple past and past participle hydroplaned)

hydroplanes (present singular third-person)
hydroplaning (participle present)
hydroplaned (participle past)
hydroplaned (past)

Don't drive too fast on wet roads or the car may hydroplane and cause you to lose control of the vehicle.

(automotive) For a car or similar vehicle to slide along the road on a thin film of water between the road and the tyres. This occurs when a car has some speed and comes to somewhere with more water on the road than the weight of the car and the grooves in the tyre tread pattern (if any) can push away. The result is almost no traction at all for steering or braking.


hydroplane

(nautical) A specific type of motorboat used exclusively for racing.

(aircraft, nautical) A seaplane; any aircraft capable of taking off from, and alighting on the surface of water.

(nautical) A hydrofoil (“hydrodynamic surface”)

(nautical) The wing of a submarine, used to help control depth


loof

Inherited from Middle English lof (“a contrivance for altering a ship's course, paddle, oar”), from Middle Dutch loef (“an oar or paddle used in steering”), ultimately of the same origin as Etymology 1. Compare luff.

der

(nautical, obsolete) A contrivance (apparently a paddle or an oar) used for altering the course of a ship.

(nautical) The after part of the bow of a ship where the sides begin to curve.


hank

From Middle English hank, of Scandinavian/North Germanic origin; akin to Old Norse hǫnk (compare haki (“something bent”)), related to Proto-Germanic *hakô (“hook”). Akin to Old English hangian (“to hang”). First known use: 14th century.

(nautical) A ring or shackle that secures a staysail to its stay and allows the sail to glide smoothly up and down.

бухта

nautical: ring or shackle to secure staysail


CASM

(travel) Acronym of cost per available seat-mile: a method of calculating operating costs in the travel industry. It is derived by dividing total operating expenses by total ASMs.


driving under the influence

en-noun

driving under the influence (uncountable)

(law, automotive) Operating a motor vehicle while impaired due to the consumption of drugs or alcohol.


cutline

If you stop and get out, you will see a cutline for line-of-sight surveying.

(surveying, travel) A linear cleared area through undeveloped land.


nock

From Middle English nokke, attested since the 14th century, probably from a Scandinavian/North Germanic language (compare Swedish nock (“notch”), but compare Dutch nok, from Middle Dutch nocke (“tip, point”). Both could be related to nook (“corner, recess”).

(nautical) The upper fore corner of a boom sail or trysail.


flotilla

From Spanish flotilla, diminutive of flota (“fleet”), from French flotte.

Toward the horizon a flotilla of fishing-boats showed immutable, pink-lacquered by the evening sun.

1919, Ronald Firbank, Valmouth, Duckworth, hardback edition, page 102

Driven from their home system by the geth nearly three centuries ago, most quarians now live aboard the Migrant Fleet, a flotilla of fifty thousand vessels ranging in size from passenger shuttles to mobile space stations.
Home to 17 million quarians, the flotilla understandably has scarce resources. Because of this, each quarian must go on a rite of passage known as the Pilgrimage when they come of age. They leave the fleet and only return once they have found something of value they can bring back to their people.

2008, BioWare, Mass Effect, Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Quarians Codex entry:

(nautical) A small fleet of warships (usually of the same class), or a fleet of small ships.


stirrup

From Middle English stirop, stirope, from Old English stiġrāp (“stirrup”), a compound of stiġe ("ascent, descent, a going up or down"; related to stīġan (“to climb”)) and rāp (“rope”), equivalent to sty + rope.
Cognate with Dutch stegereep, stegelreep (“stirrup”), Old Saxon stigerēp (“stirrup”), Middle High German stereip, stegreif ("stirrup"; > German Stegreif (“improvisation”)), Icelandic stigreip (“stirrup”).

gloss

"ascent, descent, a going up or down"; related to <i class="Latn mention" lang="ang">stīġan</i> (“to climb”)

"stirrup"; > German <i class="Latn mention" lang="de">Stegreif</i> (“improvisation”)

For quotations using this term, see Citations:stirrup.

(nautical) A rope secured to a yard, with a thimble in its lower end for supporting a footrope.


birthing

(nautical) Alternative spelling of berthing


small stuff

(nautical) thin string, as opposed to the thick, heavy ropes that are more often used in sailing. It is commonly used in a whipping knot to bind the ends of ropes to prevent fraying.


car battery

internal combustion engine
internal combustion engine

(automotive) A 12-volt battery used to run the electric starter motor in order to ignite the internal combustion engine of an automobile, and power accessories when the engine is off and the alternator is not turning.

Autobatterie

battery used to start the engine of an automobile


thumper

en-noun

thumper (countable and uncountable, plural thumpers)

(UK, rail transport, slang) A kind of slam-door train introduced in the late 1950s.


RSN

Republic of Singapore Navy
w:Republic of Singapore Navy

(Singapore, military, nautical) Initialism of Republic of Singapore Navy.


DH

(military, nautical) Initialism of heavy destroyer, a variant of the destroyer type of warship.


Piccadilly

Audio (US)

From Pickadilly Hall, a house belonging to a tailor who specialized in a type of lace collar called a piccadill, possibly from conjectured Spanish *picadillo, from picado (“punctured, pierced”); compare 17th century Spanish picadura (“a similar lace collar”).
Piccadilly attested from 1743; previously the area was called Portugal, and the street Portugal Street (1692), after Catherine of Braganza.

(rail transport) Manchester Piccadilly station, the main railway station in Manchester.

Why Piccadilly? The Piccadilly Line was originally the Great Northern, Piccadilly & Brompton Railway (GNP&BR) which was shortened to Piccadilly in practice. Running under the main road between Piccadilly Circus and Hyde Park Corner, Piccadilly made sense and was also the most well-known location in the original company name.

2024 March 6, Stefanie Foster, “The changing face of the Piccadilly...”, in RAIL, number 1004, page 52:

(rail transport) The Piccadilly Line of the London Underground, originally known as the Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway.


diamond crossover

diamond crossover (plural diamond crossovers)

Named after the diamond crossing in its center.

"In 15 is illustrated the diamond crossover, one of the many kinds in common use."

1916, Lee O. Kellogg, editor, Details of Practical Mining, page 458:

"It travelled on until the bogie fouled a diamond crossover at the north end of the station where derailment became complete."

1955, L.T.C. Rolt, Red for Danger: A History of Railway Accidents and Railway Safety Precautions, page 104:

"Increased height is necessary when scales or a double hump lead with diamond crossover is placed on the descending slope of the hump."

1956, Robert William Abbett, American Civil Engineering Practice, page 2:

"A diamond crossover provides each track with access to the entire yard."

1958, S. Kip Farrington, Railroads of the Hour, page 230:

"Each chamber contains a diamond crossover designed for 60 km/h running."

1995, Institution of Civil Engineers (Great Britain), The Channel Tunnel, →ISBN, page 20:

"The closed-deck ballasted bridge is double-tracked and opens up to a third track through a combination diamond-crossover and double-slip switch before it reaches the bulkhead on the Hoboken side."

2002 August, Paul Jannotti, “Thinking outside the box on light rail: Hudson-Bergen project”, in Railway Track and Structures:

2004 — U.S. Federal Register, v. 69 #101, May 25, 2004, p. 29780.
"The reason given for the proposed changes is that the crossover and switches were installed to replace a diamond crossover. The BNSF is taking their north connecting track out of service, so the control point with the crossover is no longer needed."

~2005 — Robert Ferreira, "North Springs Branch", in "MARTA North Springs and Doraville Branches", http://world.nycsubway.org/us/atlanta/marta-northbranches.html.
"In December, 1999 a new diamond crossover interlocking was placed into service at Medical Center."

(rail transport) superimposed pair of railway crossovers, resembling a letter X, permitting to travel in either direction between a pair of parallel tracks


SSP

(rail transport) The station code of Sham Shui Po in Hong Kong.


gridiron

gridiron (countable and uncountable, plural gridirons)

From resembling the shape of a gridiron (a square rectilinear grid).

(nautical) An openwork frame on which vessels are placed for examination, cleaning, and repairs.


nonrev

Short for nonrevenue, as they do not pay for their tickets.

(aviation, travel, informal) Pertaining to nonrevenue travel taken by airline employees.


nonrev

(aviation, travel, informal) An airline employee flying as a passenger.


interlaced

(rail transport) Synonym of gauntleted (“having overlapping parallel rail tracks”).


California roll

California roll (plural California rolls)

(colloquial, automotive) A rolling stop (when a car slows down at a stop sign, but does not come to a complete stop).


metals

It was appropriate that 'King' number 6000 began the return to steam on British Rail metals in 1971.

Now and again a night train roared along the metals within twenty feet of him; but he had all the Oriental’s indifference to mere noise, and it did not even weave a dream through his slumber.

1900 December – 1901 October, Rudyard Kipling, “chapter 8”, in Kim (Macmillan’s Colonial Library; no. 414), London: Macmillan and Co., published 1901, →OCLC:

They stood on the foot-bridge over Boathouse Station and looked at the metals gleaming coldly.

1913, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, “chapter 7”, in Sons and Lovers, London: Duckworth & Co. […], →OCLC:

Steam services began running over NR [Network Rail] metals from Grosmont to the traffic objective of Whitby in 2007, with operations enhanced by opening of the second platform at the terminus in 2014.

2019 October, James Abbott, “Esk Valley revival”, in Modern Railways, pages 77, 78:

(rail transport) the rail tracks owned by a company or organisation; a rail network


bends

(nautical) The thickest and strongest planks in a wooden ship's side, wales.


switchback

The noun is derived from switch (“to turn (a train) from one railway track to another using a switch”, verb) + back (“so as to reverse direction and return”, adverb).
The verb is derived from the noun.

compound

"Of course," said Harry, "there will have to be a branch track built, and a ‘switch-back’ up the hill."

1873, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], Charles Dudley Warner, chapter XLIX, in The Gilded Age: A Tale of To-day, Hartford, Conn.: American Publishing Company, published 1874, →OCLC, page 445:

Marriage was the switchback, the giant racer, the lobster teas, the guarantee that one would never be alone.

1934, Graham Greene, chapter 4, in It’s a Battlefield, library edition, London: William Heinemann, published 1959, →OCLC, page 171:

A railway track on a steep slope in a zigzag formation, in which a train travels in a reverse direction at each switch.

serpentiinirata

The WR faction claims that the Westbury route is better adapted to high speed, to which advocates of the SR route are apt to retort that the effect of modern diesel traction on schedules over the Salisbury–Exeter switchback has yet to be measured (the speed potential between Waterloo and Salisbury is scarcely disputable) […]

1964 March, “News and comment: Which way to the west?”, in Modern Railways, Shepperton, Surrey: Ian Allan Publishing, page 147:

A railway track on which there are steep ascents and descents, a train moving partially or fully by the force of gravity using the momentum generated when descending to travel up an ascending part of the track; especially (British, dated), such a track built for fun rides at an amusement park; a type of rollercoaster.

mäkinen rata

Coordinate term: horseshoe curve

Already, we enter some airport bathrooms through a brief switchback of walls, so that we don’t ever grasp a door handle.

2019 April 25, Samanth Subramanian, “Hand dryers v paper towels: the surprisingly dirty fight for the right to dry your hands”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2022-12-21:

(chiefly Canada, US, road transport) A sharp bend in a path or road which causes a traveller to almost reverse their direction of travel, especially one of a series of such bends on an incline; a hairpin bend; also a path or road having such a series of bends.


MEF

(rail transport) The station code of Mei Foo in Hong Kong.


unnavigable

en-adj

unnavigable (comparative more unnavigable, superlative most unnavigable)

more unnavigable (comparative)
most unnavigable (superlative)

A road journey of 70 miles past unnavigable rapids leads to Juba, from which it is seven days' steaming down river through to Kosti, on the Sudan Railways.

1950 May, Timothy H. Cobb, “The Tanganyika Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 298:

Not navigable. Difficult or impossible to navigate.


foul wind

We lost several hours having to tack into a foul wind just off the coast.

(nautical) A wind blowing against the direction of travel.


fair wind

(nautical) A favourable wind, i.e. one blowing in the desired direction of travel for the vessel.


keepnet

Once she'd hooked them, she'd free them and put them in a keep net.

1973, Elizabeth Mavor, A Green Equinox, Virago, published 2023, page 116:

(nautical) A net strung on wire hoops and sealed at one end, suspended in water by anglers to keep alive the fish they have caught.


keelson

Late Middle English kelswayn, from Low German kielswîn, kielswīn, from kiel (“keel of a ship”) (from Old Norse kjǫlr) + swin (“swine”), used as the name of a timber (however, compare sill).
Compare with Dutch kolzwijn, kolsem, Low German, kielswîn, German Kielschwein, Danish kølsvin, kölsvin, all with the same meaning.

With regard to materials, all the frames should be of oak and so should the stem piece, stern post, upper portion of dead woods, knight heads, apron, beams, shelf clamp, bilge strakes, and keelson; the keel will generally be found to be either English or American elm.

1884, Dixon Kemp, A Manual of Yacht and Boat Sailing (Fourth Edition), page 13:

(nautical) A longitudinal beam fastened on top of the keel of a vessel for strength and stiffness.


boneyard

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-boneyard.wav

B-52s in a boneyard

a 440 V-8 from the boneyard

Or what is conveyed to those unversed in railway matters by reports following a shed visit that "the frame of Claud Hamilton lay in the boneyard and had many endearing messages of farewell chalked on it"?

1951 April, R. S. McNaught, “Railway Enthusiasts”, in Railway Magazine, number 600, page 269:

The “Boneyard” is a place of antiques and historic symbolism, a burial ground for aircraft.

1999, Naval Aviation News, volumes 82-83, page 37:

Beginning in December 1969, the entire fleet was retired to the “boneyard” at Davis-Monthan AFB in Tucson, Arizona.

2017, William A. Flanagan, Aviation Records in the Jet Age:

(aviation, automotive, slang) A dumpsite for obsolete or unusable aircraft etc; a junkyard.


nitrous

From Middle French nitreux, and its source, Latin nitrōsus (“nitrose”).

(dentistry, automotive, informal) Nitrous oxide.

When a shot this big is being run, it will also be necessary to pull 6-10 degrees of timing out when the nitrous is being run.

2002, Mike Kojima, Honda/Acura Engine Performance: How to Modify D, B and H Series Honda/Acura Engines for Street and Drag Racing Performance, Penguin, →ISBN, page 111:

To simulate nitrous, we will use a very simple approach: apply a large force to the back of the car when the nitrous is on.

2004, Simon Carless, Gaming Hacks, "O'Reilly Media, Inc.", →ISBN, page 320:

When tested on a typical summer day, an engine with fuel fed by an annular discharge booster could be 10 hp less over a stepped dogleg booster, but 10 hp more when the nitrous is in operation.

2013, David Vizard, David Vizard's How to Super Tune and Modify Holley Carburetors, CarTech Inc, →ISBN, page 74:

(automotive, informal) The system in some racing vehicles which pumps nitrous oxide into the engine to improve performance.


gridlock

en-noun

gridlock (countable and uncountable, plural gridlocks)

(road transport) A condition of total, interlocking traffic congestion on the streets or highways of a crowded city, in which no one can move because everyone is in someone else's way.


ramed

(nautical) Having the frames, stem, and sternpost adjusted; — said of a ship on the stocks.


pooped

en-adj

pooped (comparative more pooped, superlative most pooped)

more pooped (comparative)
most pooped (superlative)

(nautical) Fitted or furnished with a poop.

Then - a shock of water, a wild rush of boiling foam, and I was clinging for my life to the shroud, ay, swept straight out from it like a flag in a gale. We were pooped. The wave passed. It seemed to me that I was under water for minutes - really it was seconds.

1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:

(nautical) Having had a wave come over the stern from abaft.


alow

From Middle English alowe, equivalent to a- + low.

I think you said something concerning the manner in which yonder ship has anchored, and of the condition they keep things alow and aloft?

1859, James Fenimore Cooper, The Red Rover: A Tale:

Ay, Ay, Ay, all is up; and I must up too / Early in the morning, aloft from alow.

1924, Herman Melville, chapter 26, in Billy Budd, London: Constable & Co.:

(nautical) Towards the lower part of a vessel; towards the lower rigging or the decks.


en-noun

M1 (countable and uncountable, plural M1s)

(road transport) A motorway number; notably the M1 Motorway in England.


circumnavigate

en-verb

circumnavigate (third-person singular simple present circumnavigates, present participle circumnavigating, simple past and past participle circumnavigated)

circumnavigates (present singular third-person)
circumnavigating (participle present)
circumnavigated (participle past)
circumnavigated (past)

Borrowed from Latin circumnāvigātus, perfect passive participle of circumnāvigō (“sail round something, circumnavigate”), from circum (“about, around”) + nāvigō (“sail, navigate”), from nāvis (“ship”) + agō (“do”). By surface analysis, circum- + navigate.

Patrick Childress, who solo circumnavigated on a Catalina 27 in 1982, stresses the value of eggs, which will keep at least six weeks if previously unrefrigerated and oiled with vegetable shortening.

1992, Richard Henderson, Singlehanded Sailing, →ISBN, page 225:

Jack and Lura Francis, both fairly tall, circumnavigated on a Westsail 32.

1997, Diana Jessie, The Cruising Woman's Advisor, →ISBN, page 30:

Chay Blyth was the first when he circumnavigated in British Steel in 292 days in 1970 in a voyage that some predicted would end in certain death.

2004 March 10, Edward Gorman, “Van den Heede rewarded for perseverance”, in Times of London:

(intransitive, sailing) To sail around the world.


bullseye

→ German: Bullauge (calque)

→ Esperanto: bovokulo (calque)

From bull's + eye. May have come from the practice of English archers shooting an arrow through the eye socket of a bull's skull as a test of skill. The connection to philately comes from the shape of the key plate or vignette.

(nautical, obsolete) Thick glass set into the side of a ship to let in light.

idi-begi

thick glass set into the side of a ship to let in light


daycoach

(US, rail transport) A normal railway car with seats, but no sleeping arrangements.


BU

(nautical) Initialism of broken up: referring to the scrapping of a decommissioned ship.


entanglement

en-noun

entanglement (countable and uncountable, plural entanglements)

pletka

that which entangles; intricacy; perplexity

That which entangles; an involvement, a complication; an intricacy; a perplexity.

(nautical) An obstruction of cables and spars across a river or harbour entrance.


locomotive

/ˌləʊkəˈməʊtɪv/

From French locomotif, from Latin locō (literally “from a place”) (ablative of locus (“place”)) + Vulgar Latin mōtivus (“moving”) (see motive).
In the rail transport sense, ellipsis of locomotive (steam) engine, attested from 1814.

(rail transport) The power unit of a train that pulls the coaches or wagons.


caravel

From Middle French caravelle, from Old French caruelle, carvelle (“caravel”), from Old Galician-Portuguese caravela (“caravel”), a diminutive of caravo, carabo (“type of small vessel”), from Late Latin carabus (“small wicker boat decked with hide”), from Ancient Greek κᾱ́ρᾰβος (kā́rabos, “type of light ship; kind of beetle, probably a longhorn beetle; kind of crustacean, probably a crayfish”).

refn

From the collection of the Musée national de la Marine in Paris, France.

der

When Gullion di'd (who knows not Gullion?) / And his drie soule arriu'd at Acheron, / He faire besought the feryman of hell, / That he might drink to dead Pantagruel. / […] Yet still he drinkes, nor can the Botemans cries, / Nor crabbed oares, nor prayers make him rise. / So long he drinkes, till the black Carauell / Stands still fast grauel'd on the mud of hell.

1597, Joseph Hall, “Sat[ire] VI”, in Virgidemiarum, Sixe Bookes. […], London: Printed by Thomas Creede, for Robert Dexter, →OCLC; republished as Virgidemiarum: Satires, … In Six Books, London: William Pickering, […], 1825, →OCLC, book III, page 41, lines 1–4 and 11–14:

We also barter'd all the Goods that were in the firſt Spaniſh Caravel, taken at our firſt ſetting out for other Commodities, and left all the Priſoners. A Caravel ſays Oforius lib. 2 is a Veſſel that has no round Top, nor any Timber acroſs the Top of the Maſt, but the Yard is made faſt a little below the Top. The Sails are triangular, and their lower Points are but little above the Deck.

1711, Francis Cauche, “A Voyage to Madagascar, the Adjacent Islands, and Coast of Africk”, in [J. Stevens], editor, A New Collection of Voyages and Travels, into Several Parts of the World, […], volume II, London: Printed for J. Knapton, Andrew Bell, D. Midwinter, Will. Taylor, A. Collins, and J. Baker, →OCLC, page 3:

On the Ninth of May, in the Year one Thouſand, five Hundred, and Two, [Christopher] Columbus and his Brother departed, from Spain, on their laſt Voyage of Diſcovery, with four Caravelles, and one hundred, and ſeventy Men.

1776, [John Campbell], John Kent, “Memoirs of Christopher Columbus”, in Biographia Nautica; Or, Memoirs of Those Illustrious Seamen, to whose Intrepidity and Conduct the English are Indebted, […] In Four Volumes, volume I, London: Printed for J. Wallis and C. Stonehouse, […], →OCLC, page 433:

At preſent theſe trees are not very numerous, as the Turks make uſe of them to build the Grand Signior's caravelles, and cut down without ever planting.

1788, [Claude-Étienne] Savary, “Letter XIII. To M. L. M.”, in Letters on Greece; being a Sequel to Letters on Egypt, […] Translated from the French …, London: Printed for G. G. J. and J. Robinson, […], →OCLC, page 98:

[T]he governor of Hiſpaniola was afraid that if the admiral returned to Spain, Their Catholic Majeſties would reſtore him to his government, and ſo he ſhould be forced to quit it; for which reaſon he would not provide, as he might have done, for the admiral's voyage to Hiſpaniola; and therefore had ſent that little caraval to ſpy and obſerve the condition the admiral was in, and to know whether he could contrive with ſafety to have him deſtroyed, […]

1812, John Pinkerton, “Of Another Mutiny among Those that Remained with the Admiral, which was Quelled by the Coming of a Vessel from Hispaniola”, in A General Collection of the Best and Most Interesting Voyages and Travels in All Parts of the World; […], volume XII, London: Printed for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, […]; and Cadell and Davies, […], →OCLC, page 150:

Probably the most famous of all the forms of craft used at this period was the caravel, so well adapted for voyages of discovery, that nearly every one of the great navigators employed ships of this character, and in them performed feats of seamanship which are absolutely astounding. […] Narrow at the poop, wide at the prow, having a double tower at the stern and a single one at its bows, the caravel carried four vertical masts, and one inclined one.

1874 December 19, “Military and Religious Life in the Middle Ages and at the Period of the Renaissance. By Paul Lacroix (Bibliophile Jacob.) Illustrated. (Chapman & Hall.) [book review]”, in The Athenæum: Journal of English and Foreign Literature, Science, the Fine Arts, Music and the Drama, number 2460, London: Printed by Edward J. Francis, […] published […] by John Francis. …, →OCLC, page 835, column 3:

Fishermen and other mariners who used caravels along the Atlantic coast of Portugal and the Cantabrian coast of Spain probably strengthened the hull to withstand the open ocean, perhaps using small whaling vessels as their model. As the Portuguese explored the coastline of Africa, they used small caravels with a two-masted lateen rig for many tasks, especially after they rounded Cape Bojador. The lateen caravel could beat its way home while keeping within reassuring sight of the coast.

1992, William D. Phillips, Jr., Carla Rahn Phillips, “Tools of Expansion”, in The Worlds of Christopher Columbus, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 71:

Thus the brand-new caravel which took [Alvise] Cadamosto to Senegambia in 1455 was a vessel of some fifty-four tons capacity.

2001, Peter Edward Russell, Prince Henry ‘the Navigator’: A Life (Yale Nota Bene), New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, →ISBN, page 229:

[T]he voyages of exploration made use of a new vessel, the caravel. Caravels were much smaller than the largest European ships and the Chinese junks Zheng He had used to explore the Indian Ocean early in the fifteenth century.

2008, Richard W. Bulliet, Pamela Kyle Crossley, Daniel R. Headrick, Steven W. Hirsch, Lyman L. Johnson, with David Northrup, “The Maritime Revolution, to 1550”, in The Earth and Its Peoples: A Global History, 4th edition, volume 1 (To 1550), Boston, Mass., New York, N.Y.: Houghton Mifflin Company, →ISBN, part 4 (Interregional Patterns of Culture and Contact, 1200–1550), page 468, column 2:

(nautical, historical) A light, usually lateen-rigged sailing ship used by the Portuguese and Spanish for about 300 years from the 15th century, first for trade and later for voyages of exploration.

karveel

light, usually lateen-rigged sailing vessel


sprit

From Middle English sprete, from Old English sprēot (“pole, pike, spear”), from Proto-Germanic *spreut, related to Proto-West Germanic *sprutō (“shoot, sprout”). Cognate with West Frisian spriet (“sprit, spoke”), Dutch spriet (“a sprit, blade, spar, shoot, sprig”), Middle High German spriez (“sprout, twig”).

cog

... and in the luminous space the tanned sails of the barges drifting up with the tide seemed to stand still in red clusters of canvas sharply peaked, with gleams of varnished sprits.

1899, Joseph Conrad, chapter 1, in Heart of Darkness:

(nautical) A spar between mast and upper outer corner of a spritsail on sailing boats.


mag wheel

(automotive, originally late 1950s and into 1960s) A wheel for a motor vehicle, made from an alloy of magnesium, typically lighter and offering better heat conduction than steel wheels; often styled in a five-point star pattern; (sometimes also) a wheel made to look like such wheels but not truly of magnesium.


FCA

(automotive) Initialism of Fiat-Chrysler Automobiles., an Italian&American automaker


burnout

en-noun

burnout (countable and uncountable, plural burnouts)

→ Dutch: burn-out

→ Finnish: burnout

→ German: Burn-out

(automotive) Use of the throttle to spin the wheels of a vehicle being held stationary, causing the spinning tires to produce smoke and burn rubber.

burn

using the throttle to spin the wheels of a vehicle being held stationary


prime mover

Originally in translation of Latin primum mobile.

(automotive) The front part of a semi-trailer type truck, i.e., the tractor to which the trailer part attaches.


running board

(rail transport) A narrow footway above the driving wheels of some steam locomotives, and along the sides of some diesel locomotives.


traverser

Before I left Paris I had the chance to visit La Chapelle depot. I was fascinated by the place. Basically, the steam depot is divided into two halves, the repair side and the steam side, with a traverser in between.

1961 March, ""Dalmore"", “Driving and firing modern French steam locomotives”, in Trains Illustrated, page 148:

The outside sidings and test areas are rail-connected at the western end to the Down Service line, whilst the test area and assembly area are connected via a traverser at the eastern end of the site.

2019 October, “Trackwatch: Wales”, in Modern Railways, page 90:


(automotive, engineering) Alternative spelling of V-twin


gaff rig

(nautical) aAsailing rig that has a fore-and-aft sail supported by a spar called a gaff.


half board

half board (countable and uncountable, plural half boards)

(uncountable, travel) A hotel rate that includes accommodation, breakfast and dinner, but no meal at lunchtime.

(countable, nautical) A manoeuvre by which a sailing-ship gains distance to windward by luffing up into the wind.


full board

(travel) A hotel rate that includes accommodation, breakfast, lunch and dinner.


push-pull

The coaches require modifications, including work to ensure they can work in push-pull mode with Class 67 locos.

2019 October, Rhodri Clark, “TfW seeks PRM derogation for Class 37 sets”, in Modern Railways, page 87:

That train is Inspection Saloon 975025, better known as Caroline. It's a former Hastings line Class 201 diesel-electric multiple unit (DEMU) buffet car converted to run in push-pull operation, with large windows at both ends to give a great view of the line ahead.

2022 December 14, Pip Dunn, “Caroline is ready for inspection...”, in RAIL, number 972, page 48:

(rail transport) Operating with locomotives at both the head and rear of a train, or with a locomotive at one end and a driving position in the vehicle at the opposite end, so that the train can be driven from either end.


hot hatch

Clipping of hot hatchback., from hot + hatchback. From being a hatchback-configuration small car, compact, subcompact that has some zip.

(automotive, informal) A high-performance hatchback small motor car.


fust

Possibly from Portuguese fusta (“fust”), from Latin fusta (“beam (of wood)”), from fūstis (“knobbed stick, cudgel, club”); compare Middle French fuste.

The great hoste abode still till noone or one of the clocke, and then arose, not all, but about 80 or 100 ships, as gallies, galliasses, and fusts: and passed one after another before the towne and haven of Rhodes three miles off, and came to shore in a place nigh to land, called Perambolin, sixe miles from the towne.

1589–1600, Richard Hakluyt, “How Part of the Navie and Armie of the Great Turke Came before the Citie of Rhodes”, in The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques & Discoveries of the English Nation (Hakluyt Society; Works, Extra Series), volume V, Glasgow: MacLehose, published 1904, →OCLC; reprinted Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014, →ISBN, page 16:

The reſt of our ſhips hearing us ſhoot in that manner, entered into their boats, and made towards them, rowing hard to the thre Indian fuſts, wherein were at the leaſt 100 men, and ſhot amongſt them with their pieces, […] and we handled them in ſuch ſort, that of 200 men there got not above thirty of them to land; the reſt of their fuſts lay far off and beheld the fight.

1745, “[A Brief Description of a Voyage Performed by Certain Hollanders to and from the East-Indies, with Their Adventures and Success.] The Manner, Custom, Householding, Child-bearing, Sporting and Cleanliness of the Women in Bantam”, in A Collection of Voyages and Travels, Consisting of Authentic Writers in Our Own Tongue, which have Not before Been Collected in English, or have Only been Abridged in Other Collections. …, volume II, London: Printed for and sold by Thomas Osborne of Gray's-Inn, →OCLC, page 414, column 1:

Sur stands on the coast of Syria, on the sea, twenty-five miles from Acre both by sea and land. Four or five large and long rocks lie in the sea before the city, some of them appearing a little above the water, the rest concealed below it. These rocks form the port of Sur, which admits ships of sixty or eighty tons, but none of a larger size; and all flat-bottomed fusts.

1827, Gilbert de Lannoy [i.e., Guillebert de Lannoy], “The Report Made by Sir Gilbert de Lannoy, upon Surveys of Several Cities, Ports, and Rivers, Taken by Him in Egypt and Syria, in the Year of Grace of Our Lord One Thousand Four Hundred and Twenty-two. By Order of the Most High, Most Puissant, and Most Excellent Prince, King Henry of England, Heir and Regent of France; whom God Pardon”, in Archaeologia; or, Miscellaneous Tracts Relating to Antiquity. Published by the Society of Antiquaries of London, volume XXI, London: Printed by J[ohn] B[owyer] Nichols, 25, Parliament Street; sold at the Society [of Antiquaries of London]'s apartments in in Somerset-Place; and by Messrs. Nornaville and Fell, Nicol, Sotheby, Wilson, Cadell, Egerton, and Taylor, →OCLC, pages 427–428:

During the first three decades of the seventeenth century, Portuguese trade from Goa to Portugal and to Gurajat rapidly declined. Pieter van den Broecke, a VOC [Vereenigde Oost-Indische Compagnie – Dutch East India Company] official in Gujarat, reported that whereas there used to come every year from 200 to 300 Portuguese fusts (or fustas, small galleys) to Cambay and Surat, only from 50 to 60 came in 1621, and the goods they carried were also of small value. [Francisco] Pelsaert, too, lamented the declining trade of Cambay by saying that in 1626 only forty merchant fusts arrived with goods of little value and that this was the cause of the decline of Cambay and indeed of all Gujarat.

2016, Ghulam A. Nadri, “The Indigo Trade: Local and Global Demand”, in The Political Economy of Indigo in India, 1580–1930: A Global Perspective (European Expansion and Indigenous Response; 22), Leiden, Boston, Mass.: Brill, →ISBN, →ISSN, page 99:

(nautical, historical) A type of small galley.


skulk

From Middle English skulke, skulken, of North Germanic origin; compare Danish skulke (“shirk”), Swedish skolka (“play truant”).

“I shall do my duty, Mr. Jackson,” replied Newton, “and fear no consequences.”
“Indeed! you saw how I settled a skulk just now;—beware of his fate!”

1832, Frederick Marryat, chapter 16, in Newton Forster; or, The Merchant Service, volume 1, London: James Cochrane, page 238:

Toward evening there was something to be done on deck, and the carpenter who belonged to the watch was missing. “Where’s that skulk, Chips?” shouted Jermin down the forecastle scuttle.

1847, Herman Melville, chapter 4, in Omoo, New York: Harper, page 32:

If you should ever need help, my son, let this be your rule—‘never ask it from the man who deserted his country in her hour of need.’ The soldier’s child will find no mercy from a skulk, depend on it.

1872, Sallie F. Chapin, chapter 7, in Fitz-Hugh St. Clair, the South Carolina Rebel Boy, Philadelphia: Claxton, Remsen & Haffelfinger, page 75:

An exempt, a skulk, or one upon whom rested the faintest suspicion of evading duty or shrinking in the critical hour of impending battle, was the special object of his wrath.

1906, Henry E. Shepherd, Life of Robert Edward Lee, New York: Neale, Part 3, p. 62:

(obsolete, chiefly nautical, military) One who avoids an obligation or responsibility.


shipbuilding

(uncountable, nautical) The construction of ships.


on deck

In every sense of the expression he is ‘on deck’; but my Jim, for the most part, skulked down below as though he had been a stowaway.

1899 September – 1900 July, Joseph Conrad, chapter 19, in Lord Jim: A Tale, Edinburgh, London: William Blackwood and Sons, published 1900, →OCLC, page 213:

(nautical) On the deck of a ship, especially of a captain or officer; in charge.


flying meet

(rail transport) The carefully-timed situation in which two opposing trains on a nominally single-track line meet at a siding and are able to pass each other without stopping, because they have reached the siding simultaneously.


becalmed

en-adj

becalmed (comparative more becalmed, superlative most becalmed)

more becalmed (comparative)
most becalmed (superlative)

[…] when we got aſterne we grew becalm'd, land-lockt in a fort, and were ſported all the way […]

1638, Thomas Herbert, Some years travels into divers parts of Asia and Afrique:

Although the breeze had now utterly failed, we had made a great deal of way during the night, and were now lying becalmed about half a mile to the southeast of the low eastern coast.

1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC:

(nautical, of a sailing ship) Unable to move due to lack of wind.


regulator

To start No. S.002 effectively with a heavy train, one opens the main regulator sufficiently to move the train off very slowly. An excess of regulator opening with the by-pass valve open can cause heavy slipping; if the worst happens, the slipping continues a little longer after the regulator is closed than on an English locomotive.

1961 March, Balmore, “Driving and firing modern French steam locomotives”, in Trains Illustrated, page 146:

This uncoupling done, Gimbert opened the regulator as Nightall climbed back onto the footplate, in order to pull the one burning wagon away from the rest of the bomb-laden train.

2022 January 12, Benedict le Vay, “The heroes of Soham...”, in RAIL, number 948, page 42:

(rail transport) A device that controls the supply of steam to the cylinders of a steam locomotive.

regulaattori

rail transport: device that controls the supply of steam to the cylinder


amain

en-verb

amain (third-person singular simple present amains, present participle amaining, simple past and past participle amained)

amains (present singular third-person)
amaining (participle present)
amained (participle past)
amained (past)

Borrowed from Spanish amainar (“to reef a sail (take in part of a sail to adapt its size to the force of the wind); to abate, die down, subside; to ease off, let up; of a person: to calm down, control one’s anger”); further etymology uncertain, probably from a regional Italian (Naples) word (compare Italian ammainare (“to lower or reef (a flag, sail, etc.)”)), from Vulgar Latin *invagīnare (“to sheathe (a sword); to put away, stow”), from Latin in- (prefix meaning ‘in, inside, within’) + vāgīna (“scabbard, sheath; covering, holder; vagina”) (possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wag- (“cover; sheath”)).

der

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-amain.wav

(nautical) To lower (the sail of a ship, particularly the topsail).

(intransitive, nautical) To lower the topsail in token of surrender; to yield.


car door

We found Jeru to be a pleasant city; with only one fault: the inhabitants will crowd into a car before passengers can get out; consequently the heads of the two columns collide near the car-door, and there is a general choke.

1863, Gail Hamilton, Gala-Days, Boston: Ticknor and Fields, page 22:

(automotive, rail transport) A door designed for use on a car (whether a railway carriage or an automobile).


railroad tie

Holonyms: railroad track, rail track, railway track, train track, permanent way

(rail transport, US) A heavy, preserved piece of hewn timber laid crossways to and supporting the rails of a railroad or a member of similar shape and function of another material such as concrete.

траверса

piece supporting the rails of a railroad


idler

(nautical, dated) Any member of a ship's crew who is not required to keep the night-watch.


chumbucket

(nautical, slang) A bucket filled with fishing bait at sea.


catwalk

→ Norwegian Bokmål: catwalk

→ Norwegian Nynorsk: catwalk

(nautical) An elevated enclosed passage providing access fore and aft from the bridge of a merchant vessel.

løbebro

nautical: elevated enclosed passage providing access fore and aft from the bridge


redcap

From red + cap.
In sense of "porter", 1890s US; compare contemporary Japanese 赤帽 (akabou), Chinese 小紅帽／小红帽 (Xiǎo Hóng Mào). On Labor Day, 1890, John Williams, an African-American railway porter, tied a red ribbon to his black uniform cap to stand out from the crowd at Grand Central Terminal. The strategy was so successful that it was soon adopted by others in the profession, leading to the synecdochic use of redcap as a term for all railway porters.

(US, rail transport) A porter in a US railway station.


VR

Virar railway station
w:Virar railway station

(rail transport) The station code of Virar railway station in India.

Victorian Railways
w:en:Victorian Railways

(Australia, rail transport, obsolete) Initialism of Victorian Railways.


come to

en-verb

come to (third-person singular simple present comes to, present participle coming to, simple past came to, past participle come to)

comes to (present singular third-person)
coming to (participle present)
came to (past)
come to (participle past)

The flood had made, the wind was nearly calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing for it was to come to and wait for the turn of the tide.

1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood’s Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC, part I:

(intransitive, idiomatic, nautical) To stop a sailing vessel, especially by turning into the wind. See also come about.


stade

From Old English staed. Cognate with German Gestade (“shore”).

(nautical, obsolete) A station for ships, as an anchorage or wharf.


headsman

From Middle English heddysman, equivalent to head + -s- + -man. Cognate with Scots hedisman, heidisman (“head man; chief; commander”). Compare also Danish høvedsmand (“captain”), Swedish hövitsman (“captain”), Icelandic höfuðsmaður (“captain”), German Hauptmann (“captain”).

(nautical) One in command of a whaling vessel.


siding

From side + -ing (“derivative noun, having the quality of”).

suffix

They slept where they could, sometimes in an empty truck on a siding near the station, sometimes in a cart behind a warehouse; [...]

1919, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, “chapter 47”, in The Moon and Sixpence, [New York, N.Y.]: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers […], →OCLC:

Laid out over six square kilometres, Sellafield is like a small town, with nearly a thousand buildings, its own roads and even a rail siding – all owned by the government, and requiring security clearance to visit.

December 15 2022, Samanth Subramanian, “Dismantling Sellafield: the epic task of shutting down a nuclear site”, in The Guardian:

(rail transport) A second, relatively short length of track just to the side of a railroad track, joined to the main track by switches at one or both ends, used either for loading or unloading freight, storing trains or other rail vehicles; or to allow two trains on a same track to meet (opposite directions) or pass (same direction) (the latter sense is probably an American definition).


pedalo

Borrowed from French pédalo, a registered trademark. By surface analysis, pedal + -o.

It is the prelapsarian Polynesia of free love, noble savagery, Kon Tiki rafting and Easter Island statuary, not the Levi’s-wearing, Toyota-driving, pédalo-pushing, efflorescent-cocktails-in-a-split-coconut-serving pseudo-paradise that awaits latter-day travellers.

2001, Stephen Brown, Marketing – the Retro Revolution, London: SAGE Publications, →ISBN, page 139:

On the other hand: I’m sorry the sculpture hurt your feelings. But it’s just art. It can’t harm you. You don’t have to like it – not at all – but it’s going to be gone in a month or so, and you can still use the pedalos while it’s there.

2018 August 16, Marina Hyde, “Sorry to break it to you, far-righters: James Bond is not on your team”, in The Guardian:

(UK, nautical) A small boat propelled by pedals that directly turn external paddles, used for recreation.


blip

en-verb

blip (third-person singular simple present blips, present participle blipping, simple past and past participle blipped)

blips (present singular third-person)
blipping (participle present)
blipped (participle past)
blipped (past)

Standing NATO Mine Countermeasures Group 1

(automotive) To apply the throttle briefly when downshifting, to provide a smoother gear transition and prevent wheelspin.


caliper

(automotive) The part of a disc brake that holds the brake pads.


messmate

Messmates, ahoy! Come here! Come here!

1879, W[illiam] S[chwenck] Gilbert, Arthur Sullivan, composer, H.M.S. Pinafore; […], San Francisco: Bacon & Company, […], →OCLC:

The cap’n was displeased at that, but my messmates were all of a mind and landed.

(nautical) An associate with whom one shares a mess (eating place) on a ship.

сътрапезник

an associate with whom one shares a mess


midshipman

(nautical) An officer of the lowest rank in several navies; especially, a trainee officer.


motorsailer

(nautical) A vessel (usually a pleasure craft) that has been designed for both sailing and motor operation.


water taxi

(nautical) A small boat that can transport small groups of passengers for a fee

taxibåd

boat that will transport small groups of passengers for a fee


horsebox

On October 31 [...] Laira "Grange" No. 6871 passed through Wolverhampton with a Holyhead-Didcot horsebox special.

1960 January, “Motive Power Miscellany: Western Region”, in Trains Illustrated, page 58:

(UK, rail transport, obsolete) A van-type railway vehicle specially built for the carriage of horses.


drafted

A johnboat is a shallow drafted boat favored by fishermen.

(nautical) of a certain depth required to float (said of a vessel); used comparatively with shallow, deep, etc.


outrigger

Modification of earlier outligger after rig (“to fit out”); equivalent to out- + ligger.

(nautical) Any of various projecting beams or spars that provide support for a sailing ship's mast.

tukipuu

(nautical) beam that provides support for a mast

(nautical) A long thin timber, pontoon, or other float attached parallel to a canoe or boat by projecting struts as a means of preventing tipping or capsizing.

(nautical) An iron bracket or brace for an oarlock projecting from the side of a rowing boat.


signalling

en-noun

signalling (countable and uncountable, plural signallings)

(rail transport) the signals and associated equipment required for their operation.


pratique

pratique (countable and uncountable, plural pratiques)

Originated 1600–10. Borrowed from Middle French practique, pratique, from Medieval Latin prāctica. Doublet of practice.

It is here a cuſtome ſtrictly obſerued (as alſo elſevvhere vvithin the Streights belonging to the Chriſtians) not to ſuffer any to trafficke or come aſhore before they haue a Pratticke from the Signoirs of Health: vvhich vvill not be granted vntill forty dayes after their arriuall, […] Notvvithſtanding, they vpon requeſt vvill carry you to the Lazaretto (vvhich is in the nature of a Peſt-houſe) there to abide vntill the date be expired. But if any fall ſicke amongſt them in the meane ſeaſon, their Pratticke is accordingly prolonged. A great inconuenience to the Merchants, but at Venice intollerable: vvhere vvhen they haue Pratticke, they are enforced to vnlade at the Lazaretto.

1615, George Sandys, “The First Booke”, in The Relation of a Iourney Begun An: Dom: 1610. […], London: […] [Richard Field] for W. Barrett, →OCLC, pages 5–6:

(nautical) Permission to use a port given to a ship after compliance with quarantine or on conviction that she is free of contagious disease.


weather deck

(nautical) A ship's deck which has no overhead protection, which is open to the weather; a ship's uppermost deck.

overdæk

uncovered deck, deck open to weather, uppermost deck


turning circle

But the horse has left his mark, for his successor is a mechanical horse designed to a large extent to copy the leading characteristics of the live horse; easy attachment to or detachment from its load, a small turning circle, a small appetite for petrol, but giving a much higher acceleration and speed, and so capable of much greater distances, so that fewer cartage units are required.

1944 November and December, T. F. Cameron, “Motor and Cartage Working”, in Railway Magazine, page 335:

(automotive, of a road vehicle) The circular path formed by the wheel furthest from the centre of the turn when turning to the maximum extent.

(nautical) The path followed by a vessel’s center of gravity when it makes a complete turn of 360° with a consistent rudder angle. (FM 55-501)


en flute

From French en flûte; the empty ports on the hull of the ship look like the holes in a flute.

(nautical, of a ship) With some or all of her cannons removed.


Union Jack

(nautical, British) The flag, consisting of the flags of England, Scotland, and Northern Ireland combined, flown on ships of the government of the United Kingdom.

(nautical, US) The flag, consisting of the blue star-studded field in the corner of the national ensign, flown at the jackstaff by ships at anchor.


oceangoing

(nautical, of a vessel) designed for use on ocean voyages


motorboat

/ˈməʊtəˌbəʊt/

(nautical) Any vessel driven by an engine (either inboard or outboard), but especially a small one.


tail block

(nautical) A block having a rope about it, and on an end hanging several feet from it.


strongback

(nautical) The fore-and-aft spar extending from stem to stern on a lifeboat and serving as a raised spreader for a boat cover. (FM 55-501)

(nautical) A strong bar placed across a hatch opening to hold hatch boards or hatch covers. (FM 55-501)


stiffship

(nautical) Too much weight concentrated in the lower holds of a vessel, resulting in excessive stability.


station bill

(nautical) A bill posted in the crew’s quarters and other conspicuous places, listing the station of the crew at maneuvers and emergency drills; sometimes called the muster roll.


cargo pallet

(nautical) A flat wooden tray used for hoisting cargo into and out of a ship's hold.


Carley float

(nautical) an early life raft consisting of a large oval ring of copper tubing covered with kapok and painted waterproof canvas.


cargo jack

(obsolete, nautical) a large screw jack used to stow a cargo (such as hides or cotton) by compressing them into a smaller volume


sternpost

(nautical) A timber or steel bar extending from the keel to the main deck at the stern of a vessel.


cargo net

(nautical) a large square net, made of rope, used to sling cargo into and out of a ship's hold


cordage

cordage (countable and uncountable, plural cordages)

So Juan stood, bewildered on the deck: / The wind sung, cordage strained, and sailors swore […]

1819 July 15, [Lord Byron], Don Juan, London: […] Thomas Davison, […], →OCLC, canto II, stanza 13:

[…] as the old craft deep dived into the green seas, and sent the shivering frost all over her, and the winds howled, and the cordage rang […]

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “chapter 22”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:

A lone river wind sighed in the cordage of the ship.

1974, Lawrence Durrell, Monsieur, Faber & Faber, published 1992, page 151:

(nautical) A set of ropes and cords, especially that used for a ship's rigging.


careenage

careenage (countable and uncountable, plural careenages)

(nautical) A beach with a steep, sandy shoreline on which a ship may be careened.

(nautical) The expense of careening a ship.


carosse

(obsolete, nautical) The open space underneath the poop deck of a galley where the captain had his bed; it evolved into the cabin.


carous

(obsolete, nautical) A form of gallery or bridge, pivoted in the middle, fitted to ancient ships as a means of boarding an enemy vessel.


captain's servant

captain's servant (plural captain's servants)

"When one reads of a distinguished naval officer having been "a captain's servant," it does not mean that he blacked the captain's boots, mixed his grog, and emptied his slops, but that he entered the service under a captain's protection."

1905, John Masefield, Sea Life in Nelson's Time:

(nautical, historical) Before 1796, the rating of a boy entering the Royal Navy at about the age of twelve before becoming a midshipman.


catharping

/ˈkætˌhɑː(ɹ)pɪŋ/

(nautical) any of the short ropes under the tops at the lower end of the futtock shrouds of a square-rigged vessel used to secure other ropes in place


carvel-built

(nautical) Of a wooden vessel: having the planks of the hull laid flush and caulked to make a smooth finish.


stranded

(nautical, of a vessel) Run aground on a shore or reef.


carrick bend

(nautical) A strong bend knot commonly used to join two lines, ropes, and hawsers when required. A reliable safe knot if tied correctly, but unsafe if tied incorrectly, which is easily done. It is a basic knot which forms part of many other knots, hitches, bends, etc.


cathole

(nautical) Either of two circular holes cut in the stern of a sailing man of war on the level of the capstan, used for the passage of stern hawsers.


topside

We believe that the failure of Sun Ship to submit a bid for topside work had no effect on the price, quality, quantity or time of performance of any contract to be awarded for the combination of drydock and topside work covered in the firm′s bid for Lot III.

1978, US General Accounting Office, Decisions of the Comptroller General of the United States, number 58, page 793:

(nautical) The surface of a ship’s hull that is above the water line.


topside

(nautical) Abovedeck, such as on the weather deck or bridge.


centre of buoyancy

centre of buoyancy (plural centres of buoyancy)

(nautical) the point through which the resultant of all buoyant forces on an immersed hull are assumed to act; the centre of mass of the displaced water.


carling

Compare French carlingue, which may be from the English.

(nautical) A piece of squared timber fitted fore-and-aft between the deck beams of a wooden ship to provide support for the deck planking.


carvel

From Middle English carvel, carvelle, carvile, kervel (“small ship; caravel”), from Old French caruelle, carvelle, kirvelle, see further at caravel. The English word is cognate with Middle Dutch karveel.

(nautical, historical) Synonym of caravel (“a light, usually lateen-rigged sailing ship”)


carry away

en-verb

carry away (third-person singular simple present carries away, present participle carrying away, simple past and past participle carried away)

carries away (present singular third-person)
carrying away (participle present)
carried away (participle past)
carried away (past)

(transitive, nautical, of a mast or rigging) To break under sudden pressure of violent wind.


cathead

(nautical) A heavy piece of timber projecting from each side of the bow of a ship for holding anchors which were fitted with a stock in position for letting go or for securing after weighing.

serviola

nautical: heavy piece of timber for holding an anchor in position

(nautical) A decorative element at the end of said timber that often depicted a cat's head


rolling stop

(automotive) An automobile driving maneuver in which a driver slows down, but does not completely stop, at a stop sign.


carline

(nautical) Alternative form of carling (“deck planking”)


towing bitt

(nautical) Any of the vertical posts on a vessel to which towing or mooring lines are secured.


tidal current

(nautical) The flow of water caused by the rise and fall of the tide.


side-by-side

(automotive) A type of multipurpose off-highway utility vehicle, with four wheels, resembling a club cart or a golf cart


cast off

cast off (third-person singular simple present casts off, present participle casting off, simple past cast off or casted off, past participle cast off)

casts off (present singular third-person)
casting off (participle present)
cast off (past)
casted off (past)
cast off (participle past)

(transitive, intransitive, nautical) To let go (a cable or rope securing a vessel to a buoy, wharf, etc.) so that the vessel may make way.


anchor buoy

(nautical) A small buoy, usually painted a distinctive color, attached to an anchor by a light line and used to indicate the location of the anchor on the bottom.


athwartships

From athwart (“across”) + ship + -s as an adverbial ending.

to place / fix / stow something athwartships; to pace the bridge athwartships

At all times except when whales were alongside, this bench was securely lashed athwartships against the rear of the Try-works.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 107, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 519:

(nautical) Across the vessel sideways, i.e. in a direction at right angles to the fore-and-aft line of the vessel.


downshift

The noun is derived from down (preposition) + shift (“slight change or movement”). The verb is derived from the noun.

compound

The driver, Lindsay, gave me a regal wave at the top after he had completed a series of perfect downshifts[.]

2000, Bob Foster, Birdum or Bust!, Henley Beach, SA: Seaview Press, page 197:

(automotive, cycling) A shift of a transmission into a lower gear, as dictated by heavier load on the engine, as for example when climbing a hill or strongly accelerating.


downshift

en-verb

downshift (third-person singular simple present downshifts, present participle downshifting, simple past and past participle downshifted)

downshifts (present singular third-person)
downshifting (participle present)
downshifted (participle past)
downshifted (past)

zwalniać

to change one’s career or lifestyle to one which is not as well paid but less stressful and more personally rewarding

落波

to shift the transmission of a car or bicycle into a lower gear

He brought the car to a stop before the bridge, downshifted and then put her at the road again in a rising disciplined snarl along the N.6 to Cannes.

a. 1962, Ernest Hemingway, chapter 27, in The Garden of Eden, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner’s Sons, published 1986, →ISBN, page 229:

(automotive, cycling) To shift (a car or bicycle) into a lower gear.

In a stick-shift vehicle, the driver must downshift when necessary; in an automatic, the transmission downshifts as needed.

(automotive, cycling) To shift a transmission into a lower gear.


wagonload

This firm regularly consigns margarine in palletised wagon-loads to a wide variety of destinations.

1961 September, B. Perren, “The Tilbury Line serves industrial North Thameside”, in Modern Railways, page 359:

Tinsley Yard in Sheffield was once one of the largest and most advanced 'hump' marshalling yards in the world. But a decline in wagonload freight led to its swift demise and much of the site has lain derelict since the 1980s. MICHAEL RHODES examines this rise and fall in Tinsley's fortunes, and the new lease of life it has been offered by rising container traffic

2021 June 2, “Tinsley reborn...”, in RAIL, number 932, page 33:

(railways) A type of freight train service in which individual wagons have separate destinations and/or cargos.


breastband

(nautical) A band of canvas, attached to a ship's rigging, that provides support for the man heaving the lead in heavy weather.


arming

the nature of the sea bed indicated by the arming in the cavity at the base[…]

2011, H. G. Mowat, Captain Carteret and the Voyage of the Swallow:

(nautical) A piece of tallow or soap put in the cavity and over the bottom of a sounding lead to pick up samples of the bottom of the sea.

(nautical, chiefly in the plural) One of the red dress cloths formerly hung fore and aft outside of a ship's upper works on holidays, or used as a visual screen during times of action.


clinker-built

From clinker + built. Clinker is derived from clink (“to clench or fasten with nails or rivets”) + -er (suffix attached to verbs forming agent nouns indicating persons or things that do actions indicated by the verbs), and clink is a northern English variant of clench (“to secure (something) with bolts, nails, etc.; (specifically) to bend the point of a nail after it has been hammered through something so that the nail cannot be removed; to clinch”), from Middle English clinken, clenchen (“to fasten, specifically with nails or rivets; to enclose; to lock up; to clench (the fingers)”) [and other forms], from Old English clenċan (“to clinch, hold fast”), a variant of clenġan (“to adhere; to remain”), from Proto-Germanic *klangijaną (“to make cling or stick”), the causative of *klinganą (“to adhere to, cling to”), from Proto-Indo-European *gleh₁y- (“to glue, stick; to smear”).

ref

From the collection of the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo, Norway.

der

The British portion of the expedition were ordered to leave Kingston, in Canada West, as early in the year as possible, in a beautiful clinker-built boat for Toronto.

1850, John J[eremiah] Bigsby, “Excursion the Seventh. Part I. Lakes Ontario and Simcoe, etc.”, in The Shoe and Canoe or Pictures of Travel in the Canadas. […], volume I, London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC, page 36:

The herring fishery in Scotland (undoubtedly the greatest fishery of the kind) is carried on from the shore. The larger number of the boats in use for many years past are open clinker-built boats, costing, with their suite of nets, about 200l.

1882, J. G. Bertram, “The National Herring Harvest”, in Companion to the Almanac; or, Year-book of General Information for 1882, London: […] [Harrison and Sons] for the Company of Stationers, and sold by J. Greenhill, […], →OCLC, part I, page 53:

Ten years ago all the bawleys were clinker-built—that is, with the streaks overlapping each other, as in boats; but the new bawleys are now all carvel-built, the planks being placed edge to edge, so as to give a smooth surface, as in yachts and large vessels.

1890 June 14 (indicated as 1891), G[eorge] A[lfred] Henty, “A Fishing Village”, in A Chapter of Adventures: Or, Through the Bombardment of Alexandria, London, Glasgow: Blackie & Son, →OCLC, page 21:

Q. Yes. When you refer to a clinker built boat, just describe that style of boat. That refers to one with a bow at each end and a sharp keel? / A. No, this boat that I had there in 1879 was a square stern boat, sharp bow of course. A clinker built is made by boards lapping over each other. It is like set-work you know.

1912 January 30, Arthur C. Clement (witness), “Deposition of Arthur C. Clement”, in The People of the State of Illinois on the Relation of Charles S[amuel] Deneen, Governor, and William H. Stead, Attorney General, Plaintiffs in Error, vs. The Economy Light and Power Company. […] Supreme Court of the United States. October Term, 1913. (No. 179; 23,036), volume I (Transcript of Record), [Washington, D.C.]: [Judd & Detweiler], →OCLC, page 261:

But best he loved to go up the firth in the boat which Leif had made him—a finished, clinker-built little model of a war galley, christened the Joy-maker—and catch the big sea fish.

1921, John Buchan, “Hightown under Sunfell”, in The Path of the King, London: Hodder and Stoughton, →OCLC, page 10:

The Leopard in fact possessed no barge: nothing more than a little clinker-built jolly-boat, patched and pieced until scarcely an original plank was to be seen.

1979, Patrick O’Brian, chapter 1, in The Fortune of War, paperback edition, London: HarperCollinsPublishers, published 2003, →ISBN, page 3:

Varnished clinker planking is common in Scandinavia. The original Folkboat was clinker-built.

2004, Hal Roth, “The Corpus Itself”, in How to Sail Around the World: Advice and Ideas for Voyaging under Sail, Camden, Me., New York, N.Y.: International Marine/McGraw-Hill, →ISBN, page 17:

As the taxi and I travelled around America I pictured myself […] in a traditional clapboard, clinker-built home with a view over Chesapeake Bay, Maryland.

2008, Stephen Fry, “Introduction”, in Stephen Fry in America, London: Harper, HarperCollinsPublishers, published 2009, →ISBN, page 9:

By this time, Wearie Willie had been replaced by Query, a clinker-built 16-footer that Patrick Senior had commissioned especially for his youngest son from Goddard's of Palm Beach.

2015, Rick Searle, “A King in a Glass Castle”, in The Man Who Saved Smithy: Fighter Pilot, Pioneer Aviator, Hero: The Life of Sir Gordon Taylor GC, MC, Crows Nest, N.S.W.: Allen & Unwin, →ISBN, page 11:

(nautical) Of a boat or ship: having the hull constructed using planks or plates laid so that each plank overlaps the edge of the plank or plate below it, and in the case of plates, behind it; the planks were traditionally secured by nails which had been clenched (or clinched), that is, after being hammered through the planks the points of the nails were bent to make them unremovable.

tinglat

having the hull constructed with overlapping hull planks or plates


upthrust

en-noun

upthrust (countable and uncountable, plural upthrusts)


backhaul

backhaul (countable and uncountable, plural backhauls)

Low rates for backhaul account for the huge volume of waste paper shipped to Asia from the US.

(transport) A return trip after delivery of cargo.

higher intermediate point
higher intermediate point

(travel, aviation, fare construction) Travel to a destination via a further point, or a higher fare point, than the destination (higher intermediate point).


caulk

caulk (countable and uncountable, plural caulks)

From Old Northern French cauquer, from Late Latin calicō (“I fill in with limestone, caulk”), from calx (“limestone, chalk”). Related to calx, cauk, chalk, and calculus.

der

[…] & we went for a long walk & fatigued ourselves so that I, for one, took a caulk in the afternoon.

1961, Oswald Frewen, Sailor's Soliloquy, page 242:


caulk

en-verb

caulk (third-person singular simple present caulks, present participle caulking, simple past and past participle caulked)

caulks (present singular third-person)
caulking (participle present)
caulked (participle past)
caulked (past)

[W]e might be disturbed during the night by an order being given to "go about," and by hearing in the quiet hours of the morning the familiar inquiry of "How's her head?" Mine often ached with the din of the men caulking all day long!

1887, Harriet W. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 112:

(nautical) To drive oakum into the seams of a ship's wooden deck or hull to make it watertight.

There was the goggle-eyed daughter a blowing the Grampus [throwing a bucket of water upon a person] with the platter-faced planter, whenever he caulked upon deck; […]

1829, William Nugent Glascock, Sailors and Saints: Or Matrimonial Manœvres, page 179:

[…] and as sleep is about the only thing there is for a sailor at sea to get in the way of recreation, he prizes it accordingly and gets all he can. It is technically called "caulking," and a man will brag of having "caulked" the whole four hours of his watch on deck […]

1897, Herbert Elliott Hamblen, William Stone Booth, On Many Seas: The Life and Exploits of a Yankee Sailor, page 40:

(nautical, slang) To take a short sleep; to nap.


oarlock

But, as luck would have it, scarcely had he started to row his boat again when an oarlock broke, and so it took him the best part of an hour to make the trip.

(nautical) A usually U-shaped device attached to the gunwale of a rowboat to hold the oars in place while rowing.


kentledge

en-noun

kentledge (countable and uncountable, plural kentledges)

(nautical) Weights (often scrap or pig iron) used as permanent ballast on ships.


steersman

And as for a tiller, the whale-boat never admits of any such effeminacy; and therefore as in gamming a complete boat’s crew must leave the ship, and hence as the boat steerer or harpooneer is of the number, that subordinate is the steersman upon the occasion, and the captain, having no place to sit in, is pulled off to his visit all standing like a pine tree.

1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 53, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:

The Indian canoe races were the most exciting of all the Regatta. Ten paddles dipped as one paddle, ten men bent as one man, while the steersman kept time for them with grunting bows.

1942, Emily Carr, “Regatta”, in The Book of Small, Toronto, Ont.: Oxford University Press, →OCLC:

(nautical) One who steers a ship or other vessel; the helmsman.


channel fever

(dated, nautical) the excitement on board ship as she approaches her destination with the prospect of liberty ashore.


ponies

I wanted that car. Also, these things are crazy on the road. Front wheel suspension, tons of ponies, but best of all, it has a tape deck.

2016, Greg Universe, “Beach City Drift”, in Steven Universe:


chart datum

(nautical) the level below which depths are indicated and above which heights of the tides are expressed; usually mean level of low water at a spring tide


chase gun

(nautical) A gun moved temporarily from its normal broadside position to fire through the chase ports in the bow or stern of a ship.


cheese down

en-verb

cheese down (third-person singular simple present cheeses down, present participle cheesing down, simple past and past participle cheesed down)

cheeses down (present singular third-person)
cheesing down (participle present)
cheesed down (participle past)
cheesed down (past)

(nautical) To coil the tail of a rope on deck so as to present a neat appearance.


trailing

(rail transport, of points and crossovers) That converges in the direction of travel.


chase port

(nautical) A hole cut in the bow of a ship through which a chase gun could fire directly ahead.


remote keyless entry

en-noun

remote keyless entry (plural remote keyless entries)

(automotive) A remote control device used to lock and unlock a vehicle's doors, open the trunk, and sound the alarm system.


Luton

From a clipping of Luton van or Luton body, which incorporate such a part into the design.

(road transport) A part of the body of a commercial or recreational vehicle that extends over the cab.


multichine

(nautical) (of a hull) having multiple chines


slaver

From slave (“enslave, traffic in slaves”) + -er.

af

The Gulnare was a fast sailer, built for a slaver originally[.]

1887, Mrs. Dominic D. Daly, Digging, Squatting, and Pioneering Life in the Northern Territory of South Australia, page 14:

(nautical) A ship used to transport slaves.