plume

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The most likely source for the plume is a large power plant in or near the city.

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Definitions (36)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (9)

  1. noun A feather, especially a large and showy one.
  2. noun A large feather or cluster of feathers worn as an ornament or symbol of rank, as on a helmet.
  3. noun A token of honor or achievement.
6 more from this dictionary »

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (16)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (2)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (9)

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Examples (50)

  • I live right there in the West Village, so the plume was luckily blowing west, away from us. —  Steven Johnson on the Web as a city
  • After the low altitude effects drop off, the plume is said to enter a "trough" region where the overall brightness of the plume drops to very low levels. —  ArmsControlWonk
  • "If you want to test clean," he said, "then you simply go to the side where the plume isn't." —  The Nation: Top Stories
  • "The data will allow us to better understand the electrical charge structure inside a volcanic plume," said scientist Ron Thomas of New Mexico Tech. "That should help us learn how the plume is becoming electrified, and how it evolves over time." —  AOL News
  • Northeast of the conspicuous plume, a smaller, darker plume also blows off the Libyan coast. —  NASA Earth Observatory
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This word has been looked up 135 times.

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Related

Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

feather ·  ribbon ·  scarf ·  wreath ·  cloak ·  plumage ·  banner ·  crest ·  streamer ·  curl ·  lace ·  fringe

Used in the same contextWord Family

plume:   plumed ·  plumes
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (3)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English, from Old French, from Latin plūma.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (2)

  1. from Middle English plume, plome, from Old French plume, French plume = Spanish Portuguese pluma = Italian piuma, a feather, plume, = Middle Dutch pluym, Dutch pluim, plume, feather, = Middle Low German plume = German pflaum, flaum, down; from Latin plūma, a small soft feather, in plural plūmæ, soft feathers, down; hence the down of the first beard, the scales on a coat of mail; cf. W.pluf = Breton plu, plumage; from √ plu, float, Sanskrit √ plu, swim, float, fly: see fleet, float, fly. Cf. feather, ult. from another root: meaning ‘fly.’
  2. from plume, n.
 

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/plum/
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