heavier-than-air
English
Adjective
heavier-than-air (comparative form only)
- (of an aircraft) Weighing more than the volume of air which it displaces.
- 1914, Victor Appleton, chapter 1, in Tom Swift And His Photo Telephone:
- And folks laughed at Santos Dumont, at the Wrights, and at all the other fellows, who said they could take a heavier-than-air machine, and skim above the clouds like a bird.
- Of, pertaining to, or using an aircraft which weighs more than the volume of air it displaces.
- 1952, "Milestones," Time, 10 Mar.,
- Died. John Thomas Moore, 65, who, on a windy day in December 1903, lent a hand putting a flying machine on a runway, was the last surviving witness to the Wright brothers' historic first heavier-than-air flight at Kitty Hawk.
- 1952, "Milestones," Time, 10 Mar.,