fire off

Idioms  

1. Say or write and send away rapidly, as in He fired off three more questions, or She fired off a letter of complaint to the president. This expression originally (from about 1700) was, and still is, used in the sense of “discharge a weapon or ammunition,” as in The police were instructed to fire off canisters of tear gas. The figurative use dates from the late 1800s.

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Example Sentences

An exercise to fire off a howitzer, an artillery weapon, was called off due to an extreme blizzard in Cambridge Bay, Nunavut.

From BBC • Apr. 12, 2026

Now they fire off messages from their phones and computers day and night.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 11, 2026

He said it was likely airports in Spain and Portugal have independent power supplies, "which will see big diesel generators which fire off when it senses no power from its usual grid supply".

From BBC • Apr. 28, 2025

A 51-foot power vessel caught fire off Catalina over the weekend, and firefighters could not save it.

From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 30, 2024

We seem to be leaving a trail of fire off the flowing capes.

From "The Hunger Games" by Suzanne Collins