life buoy
English
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Alternative forms
[edit]Etymology
[edit]From the way it can save someone's life by buoying them up so that they do not drown.
Noun
[edit]life buoy (plural life buoys)
- (British) A buoyant object (most commonly torus-shaped) that is used as a life-saving device by keeping a person afloat.
- Synonyms: (US) life preserver, life ring, lifesaver
- 1910, Official Gazette of the United States Patent Office:
- A spherical life buoy having an air chamber formed therein, an entrance opening communicating with the interior of said life buoy, air inlet and exhaust pipes extending exteriorly therof, a perforated housing for each of said pipes, a dome secured to teh periphery of said life buoy and covering said housings, said dome being perforated, and means for supporting said life buoy upon the deck of a vessel.
- 1981, Compilation of Regulations Related to Mineral Resource Activities:
- At least four approved ring life buoys shall be placed on each manned platform.
- 2007, Daniel E. Blaney, Old Orchard Beach:
- Also, a life buoy was attached to the fuselage.
- 2012, Jay Henry Mowbray, Sinking of the Titanic: Eyewitness Accounts:
- He had on a life buoy and a life preserver. He clung there a moment and then he slid off again.
- (British, figurative) Something that rescues one from difficulties.
- 2001, Suzanne Jill Levine, Manuel Puig and the Spider Woman: His Life and Fictions, page 166:
- Fearing that he might become permanently sewn into the Air France uniform he put on every morning, Manuel regarded Mario's faith in him as a life buoy.
- 2006, Peter van Kemseke, Towards an Era of Development, page 43:
- Above all, the Marshall Plan was a life buoy for the then sinking French economy.
- 2008, Fleur Yano, Collected Writings of Flora Belle Jan, page 89:
- I but pity him, who, losing me, found the bright stars dimmed, And frantically seized you as a life buoy.
- 2012, Holly Reese, Rising from the Abyss, page 116:
- I was so exhausted and weak that several times, I nearly collapsed in the store. My shopping cart became my life buoy as I hung on to it and stubbornly kept going.
Related terms
[edit]Translations
[edit]life preserver — see life preserver