mothball
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
adjective
idioms
noun
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Also called: camphor ball. a small ball of camphor or naphthalene used to repel clothes moths in stored clothing, blankets, etc
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to postpone work on (a project, activity, etc)
verb
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to prepare (a ship, aircraft, etc) for a long period of storage by sealing all openings with plastic to prevent corrosion
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to take (a factory, plant, etc) out of operation but maintain it so that it can be used in the future
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to postpone work on (a project, activity, etc)
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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mothballsimple
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mothballssimple
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have mothballedperfect
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has mothballedperfect
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am mothballingprogressive
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are mothballingprogressive
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is mothballingprogressive
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have been mothballingperfect progressive
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has been mothballingperfect progressive
Past
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mothballedsimple
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had mothballedperfect
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was mothballingprogressive
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were mothballingprogressive
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had been mothballingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of mothball
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:
“It literally goes into mothball mode,” said Len Kientz, Evonik’s director of energy management in North America.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 10, 2026
At Pascagoula Hospital, the city’s only acute-care health facility, a wave of departures has left 80 unfilled openings for registered nurses, forcing administrators to mothball a third of its beds.
From New York Times ● Jan. 23, 2022
Also, the shipyard is home to a mothball fleet — many ships on the way to scrapping — which fluctuates in size.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 3, 2021
Briant has had to mothball the giant inflatable walk-through colon she used to send to events in tribal areas and gatherings of agricultural workers throughout Washington State.
From Scientific American ● Nov. 18, 2021
For example, many combat ships are being returned to active duty from the "mothball fleet" and many others can be put into service on very short notice.
From State of the Union Address by Truman, Harry S.
I may still need to get my megaphone out of mothballs after all.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 23, 2024
Growing up, restaurateur Andy Kalish associated two smells with Friday nights: his grandmother's chicken soup and mothballs in his grandfather's closet.
From Salon ● Apr. 16, 2022
The September 1974 journal, dog-eared and smelling of pipe smoke and mothballs, included the first published reference to Morgan commissioning the timepiece.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 9, 2021
He wasn’t interested in anything that reeked of mothballs and dust.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 29, 2021
Granddaddy smelled like wool, tobacco, mothballs, and peppermint.
From "The Evolution of Calpurnia Tate" by Jacqueline Kelly
Plans were approved, then mothballed, and then resurrected.
From BBC ● Jul. 13, 2026
The war could make it easier for Takaichi to reopen mothballed nuclear plants that were supplying 30% of the country’s electricity before the 2011 Fukushima disaster.
From Barron's ● May 14, 2026
After the gaffe, Ackman mothballed the IPO entirely.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 10, 2026
Fountainhall Primary was mothballed - shut on a temporary basis - in 2025 but now the local authority is looking to begin the process to close its doors permanently.
From BBC ● Mar. 23, 2026
The sweet, slightly chemical scent of gun oil; the raw wood of newly constructed shell crates; the mothballed odor of old bedspreads—he’s in the hotel.
From "All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr
Goldman Sachs raised its second-quarter Brent crude forecast by $10 to $76 a barrel, as Iraq began mothballing some oil production.
From Barron's ● Mar. 4, 2026
Critics say this mothballing will amount to a death warrant, and have asked San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors to give the fountain another chance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 7, 2026
The MPs pointed to "widely reported" recruitment issues, with more people leaving the armed forces than being recruited, and the mothballing of Royal Navy vessels due to crew shortages.
From BBC ● Mar. 7, 2024
Fifteen years ago, former Nebraska and Arizona State quarterback Sam Keller filed a class-action lawsuit that in 2013 resulted in Electronic Arts Sports mothballing its popular “College Football” video game.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 7, 2024
But that era ended when Alcoa terminated the Intalco agreement before mothballing the facility in 2020.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 20, 2022
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.
