funnel cloud

American

noun

a rapidly rotating funnel-shaped cloud extending downward from the base of a cumulonimbus cloud, which, if it touches the surface of the earth, is a tornado or waterspout.

funnel cloud British

noun

a whirling column of cloud extending downwards from the base of a cumulonimbus cloud: part of a waterspout or tornado

"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

Example Sentences

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funnel cloud

In Ventura County, video footage captured a funnel cloud swirling over the foothills in Santa Paula.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 21, 2024

A funnel cloud moving over Madison, a suburb in Tennessee, caused electrical flashes and a small explosion seen in a video shared on social media.

From BBC ● Dec. 10, 2023

Although strong thunderstorms are fairly routine in the nation’s capital, Mansfield said a particular type of “spin in the atmosphere” is what tips things over into funnel cloud conditions.

From Seattle Times ● Jul. 25, 2023

In early 2021, a Wikipedia editor peered into the future and saw what looked like a funnel cloud on the horizon: the rise of GPT-3, a precursor to the new chatbots from OpenAI.

From New York Times ● Jul. 18, 2023

I spun underwater, creating a funnel cloud, and blasted out of the deep end, straight at Luke’s face.

From "The Sea of Monsters" by Rick Riordan

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