# airplane

Pronunciation: say "AIR-playn" US /ˈɛɹˌpleɪ̯n/, UK /ˈɛəˌpleɪ̯n/

## Noun

1. A powered aircraft that is heavier than air and has fixed wings.
   - Simple: A machine with an engine and fixed wings that flies through the air.
   - _The airplane circled the airport twice before it was cleared to land._
   - _Early airplanes were built from wood, wire, and stretched fabric._
2. A game for coaxing a small child to eat, in which a parent or caregiver pretends that a spoonful of food is an aircraft flying into the child's mouth.
   - Simple: A game that gets small children to eat by pretending a spoon of food is a flying plane.
   - _By the third night of teething, she was reduced to playing airplane with a spoonful of mashed carrots._
   - _Playing airplane worked for about three bites before the baby lost interest._

## Verb

3. To travel through the air in a plane.
   - Simple: To go from one place to another by plane.
   - _Most of the delegates will airplane in on Friday, but a few are driving._
   - _In those days, airplaning across the country still felt like an adventure._
4. To transport people or goods by plane.
   - Simple: To send or carry people or things somewhere by plane.
   - _Growers airplane fresh flowers to markets thousands of miles away._
   - _When the road washed out, the army airplaned food and fuel into the valley._

## Origin

Formed from air + plane as an alteration of aeroplane.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/airplane (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).