floe
pronunciation
How to pronounce floe in British English:
UK [fləʊ]
How to pronounce floe in American English:
US [floʊ]
-
- Noun:
- a flat mass of ice (smaller than an ice field) floating at sea
Word Origin
- floe
- floe: see flake
- floe (n.)
- 1817, first used by Arctic explorers, probably from Norwegian flo "layer, slab," from Old Norse flo, from Proto-Germanic *floho-, from PIE *plak- (1) "to be flat," extended form of root *pele- (2) "flat, to spread" (see plane (n.1)). Related to first element in flagstone. Earlier explorers used flake. Floe-rat was a seal-hunter's name for the ringed seal (1880).
Example
- 1. Somehow the seal manages to reach a tiny ice floe .
- 2. Canadian teenager jupi nakoolak is spotted after three days adrift on an ice floe in hudson bay .
- 3. Two crew members parachuted on to a larger floe , and then crawled on their bellies to reach him .
- 4. At one point an ice floe the team 's tent was moored on broke apart , although no one was injured .
- 5. The extracted core has a thermal inertia which allows readings to be taken a short time after it was taken from the ice floe .