Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The motion of an object in or through a medium, especially through the earth's atmosphere or through space.
  • noun An instance of such motion.
  • noun The distance covered in such motion.
  • noun The act or process of flying through the air by means of wings.
  • noun The ability to fly.
  • noun A swift passage or movement.
  • noun A scheduled airline run or trip into space.
  • noun A group, especially of birds or aircraft, flying together.
  • noun A number of aircraft in the US Air Force forming a subdivision of a squadron.
  • noun A round of competition, as in a sports tournament.
  • noun An exuberant or transcendent effort or display.
  • noun A series of stairs rising from one landing to another.
  • noun A curved plate or flange that winds in a spiral around the center shaft of an auger, designed to transport loose material upward or backward along the shaft as the auger rotates.
  • intransitive verb To migrate or fly in flocks.
  • noun The act or an instance of running away; an escape.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To put to flight; rout; frighten away.
  • noun An obsolete spelling of flite.
  • noun The act or power of flying; a passing through the air by the help of wings; volitation.
  • noun Swift motion in general; rapid movement or passage caused by any propelling force: as, the flight of a missile; a meteor's flight; the flight of a fish toward its prey; the flight of a rapidly revolving wheel.
  • noun A number of beings or things flying or passing through the air together; especially, a flock of birds flying in company; the birds that fly or migrate together; the birds produced in the same season: applied specifically in the old language of English sport to doves and swallows, and in America to pigeons, and also to a swarm of bees.
  • noun Figuratively, an excursion or sally; a passing out of or beyond a fixed course; a mounting or soaring: as, a flight of imagination or fancy; a flight of ambition or of temper.
  • noun In archery: The sport of shooting arrows in the manner now called roving—that is, with roving aim instead of at a butt. See rover.
  • noun Shooting with the longbow in general, as distinguished from the use of the crossbow. See flight-arrow.
  • noun A continuous series of steps or stairs; the part of a stairway extending directly from one floor or one landing to another.
  • noun The glume or husk of oats.
  • noun The thin membrane which is detached from the coffee-berry in the process of roasting.
  • noun In the clapper of a bell, the dependent piece or weight below the striking part; the tail.
  • noun In machinery: The inclination of the arm of a crane or of a cat-head.
  • noun A wing or fin; a fan.
  • noun Synonyms 3. See flock, n.
  • Swift in transit.
  • In sporting, belonging to a flight or flock.
  • noun In archery: The course of an arrow through the air.
  • noun The distance traversed by an arrow.
  • noun In mach.: A wing or scraper, pushed or pulled through the trough of a conveyer by a chain, to drag the load through it.
  • noun A flat bucket or vane on the periphery of a wheel-pump or on the chain which it drives.
  • noun Same as flyboat.
  • noun In angling, the set of spinning-baits attached by the trace to the reel-line in a spinning-tackle.
  • noun A primary, flight-feather, or remex: a term commonly used by pigeon-fanciers.
  • noun The distance a bird may or does fly; the height at which it flies: in these senses, largely figurative.
  • noun A group of three or more locks situated in such close proximity along a canal that the level of water between any two adjacent locks of the series may economically be raised and lowered to produce a lift: in distinction from locks arranged in isolated pairs with considerable distance between the different pairs.
  • noun The act of fleeing; the act of running away to escape danger or expected evil; hasty departure.
  • To take flight; fly: an English sporting use.
  • To shoot (wildfowl) in their flight to or from their feeding-grounds.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The act of flying; a passing through the air by the help of wings; volitation; mode or style of flying.
  • noun The act of fleeing; the act of running away, to escape danger or expected evil; hasty departure.
  • noun Lofty elevation and excursion; a mounting; a soaring.
  • noun A number of beings or things passing through the air together; especially, a flock of birds flying in company; the birds that fly or migrate together; the birds produced in one season.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English flyht; see pleu- in Indo-European roots.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, from Old English *flyht; see pleu- in Indo-European roots.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle English, from Old English flyht, from Proto-Germanic *fluhtiz. Cognate with Dutch vlucht and German Flucht.

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Examples

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  • "In the (British) Royal Flying Corps, a division of the air fleet equivalent to one third of a squadron."

    December 14, 2006

  • In NASA, FLIGHT is also the shorthand term used in the control room for flight director.

    July 24, 2009