fire extinguisher
noun
a portable container, usually filled with special chemicals for putting out a fire.
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fire extinguisher
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fire-extinguisher
fire-extinguishernouna portable device for extinguishing fires, usually consisting of a canister with a directional nozzle used to direct a spray of water, chemically generated foam, inert gas, or fine powder onto the fire
fire extinguisher
Americannoun
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fire extinguishers
plural
fire-extinguisher
British
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of fire extinguisher
First recorded in 1830–40
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“He used a fire extinguisher in an attempt to extinguish the fire and observed additional fires spotting in close proximity,” the report states.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 23, 2026
Too late, a UN security guard rushes in with a fire extinguisher.
From Barron's ● Aug. 7, 2026
Her parents made sure she knew how to use a fire extinguisher, which was very heavy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 13, 2026
One man tried to tackle the fire at the shop with a small fire extinguisher but had to abandon the attempt after a series of explosions.
From BBC ● Mar. 13, 2026
A mix of water and snot blew out of the polar bear’s nose like a fire extinguisher.
From "Two Degrees" by Alan Gratz
Before she started training to be a matador, she had worked in a beauty parlor and then as a typist at a fire-extinguisher factory, and both jobs drove her crazy.
From Slate ● Mar. 29, 2014
One of them, Fred Sullivan, has lifted his Walter Kidde Co. from a burglar-alarm and fire-extinguisher manufacturer with $40 million in sales five years ago to a $350 million conglomerate.
From Time Magazine Archive
Every one of those dots is simply a little hole in the wall through which, in case of fire, will flow quart after quart of my chemical fire-extinguisher?
From Mr. Hawkins' Humorous Adventures by Edgar Franklin
The looks of them would fool anybody, but they were lung-testers, and there that old building was, with twenty-four lung-testers in it, and not one fire-extinguisher.
From Kilo : being the love story of Eliph' Hewlitt, book agent by Ellis Parker Butler
I might raffle 'em off, only nobody'd be likely to buy chances on a fire-extinguisher.
From Kilo : being the love story of Eliph' Hewlitt, book agent by Ellis Parker Butler
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.
