flak
or flack
[flak]
- antiaircraft fire, especially as experienced by the crews of combat airplanes at which the fire is directed.
- criticism; hostile reaction; abuse: Such an unpopular decision is bound to draw a lot of flak from the press.
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Origin of flak
1935–40; < German Fl(ieger)a(bwehr)k(anone) antiaircraft gun, equivalent to Flieger aircraft (literally, flyer) + Abwehr defense + Kanone gun, cannon
Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018
Examples from the Web for flak
Contemporary Examples
It felt to me like a plane flying through the flak of an economy.
You fired off a tweet about ISIS recently that got you some flak.
Bill Maher: 'Sorry J. Law, We're Going to Have to Look at Your Nipples…'Marlow Stern
September 10, 2014
They looked younger now than when weighed down in camouflage, flak jackets and helmets.
When NYC Prep premiered, it got a lot of flak for the sheer gall of its unreality.
He was bare armed under a protective jacket a jail official termed “a kind of flak jacket.”
Historical Examples
Sim's ship had picked up a small piece of flak, but it had done no damage.
A Yankee Flier Over BerlinAl Avery
Stan laid over and made a sweep, ducking in and out of the flak.
A Yankee Flier Over BerlinAl Avery
Over the estuary of the Rhine River Stan met his first flak.
A Yankee Flier Over BerlinAl Avery
I'll take you right down on top of them, and nuts to their flak fire.
Dave Dawson at TrukRobert Sydney Bowen
There were flak towers, but they were too dangerous and we all flew around them.
The Biography of a RabbitRoy Benson
flak
flack
- anti-aircraft fire or artillery
- informal a great deal of adverse criticism
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Word Origin
C20: from German Fl (ieger) a (bwehr) k (anone), literally: aircraft defence gun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition
© William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
Word Origin and History for flak
n.
1938, from German Flak, condensed from Fliegerabwehrkanone, literally "pilot warding-off cannon." Sense of "anti-aircraft fire" is 1940; metaphoric sense of "criticism" is c.1963 in American English.
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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper