jettison
verbEtymology From Anglo-Norman getteson, from Old French getaison, from geter, jeter (modern French: would be *jetaison like pendaison); possibly from a Vulgar Latin *iectātiō, from *iectātus < iectāre, from Latin iactō. Doublet of jetsam.
1
To eject from a boat, submarine, aircraft, spaceship or hot-air balloon, so as to lighten the load.
- The ballooners had to jettison all of their sand bags to make it over the final hill.
- The fuel tanks were jettisoned.
1 more example
- Kidnapped Africans en route to the Americas were cursorily examined by the ship's surgeons in an attempt to cut losses by immediately jettisoning those with such stigmata as Winterbottom's sign, a swelling of the lymph nodes found in those who harbored trypanosomiasis, or sleeping sickness.2008, Harriet A. Washington, “Southern Discomfort”, in Medical Apartheid, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, page 60:
2
Figuratively To let go or get rid of as being useless or defective.
- Among the most modern of all the Pacific stock in Great Britain is the stud of "Merchant Navy" and "West Country" Pacifics on the Southern Region, and the rebuilding which is now being carried out, preserving all the best features of the Bulleid designs—such as the free-steaming boiler—and jettisoning the features that have given trouble, in particular the chain-driven valve-motion, should give the Southern a supply of highly-competent machines able to last out the remaining life of steam on the S.R.1957 July 23, Cecil J. Allen, “British Locomotive Practice and Performance”, in Railway Magazine, page 496:
- […] the defense of horrendous behavior as “free speech”; the jettisoning of “free speech” when it served corporate purposes; the way no one seeks permission but all expect forgiveness.2018 October 30, David Streitfeld, “Where Trolls Reigned Free: A New History of Reddit”, in New York Times:
- Derived terms
- jettisonable, unjettisoned