lifeboat

lifeboat

English

Etymology

From life +‎ boat.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪfˌbəʊt/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈlaɪfˌboʊt/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

lifeboat (plural lifeboats)

1. (nautical) A boat especially designed for saving the lives of shipwrecked people or people in distress at sea (either launched from the shore with a crew, or else carried on board a larger ship).
   • 1971, Alice Cooper, Glen Buxton, Michael Bruce, Dennis Dunaway, Neal Smith, "Halo of Flies", Alice Cooper (band), Killer.

     I've got a watch that turns into a lifeboat

2. (science fiction) An emergency vehicle carried aboard a spaceship.

Synonyms

• quarter boat, rowboat, raft

Derived terms

• lifeboat ethics
• lifeboatman
• lunar lifeboat

Translations

a boat to save shipwrecked people

Arabic: قَارِب نَجَاةَ‎ m (qārib najāha) Bulgarian: спасителна лодка (spasitelna lodka) Catalan: bot salvavides m Chinese: Mandarin: 救生船 (zh) (jiùshēngchuán), 救生艇 (zh) (jiùshēngtǐng) Czech: záchranný člun m Dutch: reddingsboot (nl) m or f Finnish: pelastusvene (fi) French: radeau de survie m German: Rettungsboot (de) n Gujarati: જીવાહોડી (jīvāhoḍī) Hebrew: סירת הצלה‎ (he) Hungarian: mentőcsónak (hu) Icelandic: björgunarbátur (is) m Indonesian: sekoci (id) Italian: scialuppa (it) f Japanese: 救命ボート (きゅうめいボート, kyūmei bōto) Latvian: glābšanas laivas Maori: poti whakaora, poti kārewa Norman: baté d'sauvetage m Norwegian: Bokmål: livbåt m Nynorsk: livbåt m Polish: łódź ratunkowa f Portuguese: barco salva-vidas m Russian: спаса́тельная ло́дка f (spasátelʹnaja lódka) Scottish Gaelic: bàta-teasairginn m, bàta-sàbhalaidh m Serbo-Croatian: Cyrillic: чамац за спасавање m Roman: čamac za spasavanje m Spanish: bote salvavidas m Swedish: livbåt (sv) c Thai: เรือชูชีพ

Verb

lifeboat (third-person singular simple present lifeboats, present participle lifeboating, simple past and past participle lifeboated)

1. To rescue; to carry to safety