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View synonyms for wildfire

wildfire

[ wahyld-fahyuhr ]

noun

  1. any large fire in brush, forests, or open spaces that spreads rapidly and is hard to extinguish.
  2. a highly flammable composition, such as Greek fire, difficult to extinguish when ignited, formerly used in warfare.
  3. sheet lightning, unaccompanied by thunder.
  4. the ignis fatuus or a similar light.
  5. Plant Pathology. a disease of tobacco and soybeans, characterized by brown, necrotic spots, each surrounded by a yellow band, on the leaves and caused by the bacterium Pseudomonas tabaci.
  6. Pathology Obsolete. erysipelas or some similar disease.


wildfire

/ ˈwaɪldˌfaɪə /

noun

  1. a highly flammable material, such as Greek fire, formerly used in warfare
    1. a raging and uncontrollable fire
    2. anything that is disseminated quickly (esp in the phrase spread like wildfire )
  2. lightning without audible thunder
  3. another name for will-o'-the-wisp


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Word History and Origins

Origin of wildfire1

First recorded before 1000; Middle English wildefire, Old English wildfȳr; equivalent to wild + fire

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Idioms and Phrases

see spread like wildfire .

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Example Sentences

When natural drought conditions already exist, in such places as Colorado, physiological drought can increase the risk of wildfires by making plants more prone to ignition.

Residents, fire commanders, and political leaders must switch from a mindset of preventing or controlling wildfire to learning to live with it.

It’s possible that 2020’s temperatures in some areas might have been even higher if not for massive wildfires.

The question, of course, is why SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes covid-19, continues to spread like wildfire when so many other viruses have been crushed.

Western states repeatedly broke records for their largest wildfires on record.

From Quartz

Besides, victory fever had spread like wildfire throughout the Allied armies.

Anti-Korean books, magazines, and comic books are selling like wildfire.

It was late October, six weeks after the initial outbreak, and the virus was rumored to be spreading like wildfire.

The dish “took off like wildfire,” says Leong, despite there being virtually no Chinese people in the area.

That kind of social sorting allows for larger outbreaks by “seeding a much larger wildfire,” he said.

Suppose that Dunsey came home the night he staked Wildfire, recite the conversation between him and Godfrey.

The news had spread like wildfire to the studies, and the other boys came flocking in during the uproar, to join in it heartily.

"Chinese labour," yelled a voice, and across the square swept a wildfire of booting and bawling.

The taste enkindled by wine, was soon fed with brandy, and spread among the native bands like a wildfire.

The story that Reynolds Bartram had "stood up for prayers" went through Bruceton and the surrounding country like wildfire.

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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.

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