fire tornado

[ fahyuhr tawr-ney-doh ]

noun

, Meteorology.

, plural fire tor·na·does, fire tor·na·dos.

1. a flaming tornado generated by intense wildfire, rarer, much larger, and more destructive than a fire whirl:

   It may have begun from the ground as a fire whirl, but it now raged with a cloud-to-ground ferocity that could only belong to an actual fire tornado.

Word History and Origins

Origin of fire tornado¹

First recorded in 1845–50