meteor

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. A bright trail or streak that appears in the sky when a meteoroid is heated to incandescence by friction with the earth's atmosphere. Also called falling star, meteor burst, shooting star.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. An abbreviation of meteorology, meteorological.
2. n. Any atmospheric phenomenon.
3. n. Specifically A transient fiery or luminous body seen in or through the atmosphere, usually in its more elevated region: a shooting-star. If it reaches the surface of the earth, it is called a meteorite, formerly aërolite, and also (very rarely) uranolite.
4. n. A small body moving in space, and of the same nature as those which become visible by encountering our atmosphere. There is reason to suppose that such bodies are very numerous, and that a large proportion of them are concentrated in swarms: it is considered very probable that a comet is only such a meteoric swarm.

Wiktionary

1. n. Any atmospheric phenomenon. (Thus the derivation of meteorology.) These were sometimes classified as aerial or airy meteors (winds), aqueous or watery meteors (hydrometeors: clouds, rain, snow, hail, dew, frost), luminous meteors (rainbows and aurora), and igneous or fiery meteors (lightning and shooting stars [next]).
2. n. A fast-moving streak of light in the night sky caused by the entry of extraterrestrial matter into the earth's atmosphere: A shooting star or falling star.
3. n. A prop similar to poi balls, in that it is twirled at the end of a cord or cable.
4. n. A striking weapon resembling a track and field hammer consisting of a weight swung at the end of a cable or chain.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. Any phenomenon or appearance in the atmosphere, as clouds, rain, hail, snow, etc.
2. n. Specif.: A transient luminous body or appearance seen in the atmosphere, or in a more elevated region.
3. n. A mass of stone or other substance which sometimes falls to the earth from space beyond the moon, burning up from atomospheric friction and creating a brilliant but usually very brief trail of light in the atmosphere; also called a shooting star.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. (astronomy) any of the small solid extraterrestrial bodies that hits the earth's atmosphere
2. n. a streak of light in the sky at night that results when a meteoroid hits the earth's atmosphere and air friction causes the meteoroid to melt or vaporize or explode