proximity fuse

British

noun

an electronically triggered device designed to detonate an explosive charge in a missile, etc, at a predetermined distance from the target

"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

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

A proximity fuse onboard the interceptor is set to explode when it comes within 10 meters of the target.

From Slate • May 13, 2021

For example, Rosenberg gave the Soviets blueprints and a working copy of the proximity fuse, one of the United States military’s most closely guarded secrets.

From Newsweek • Aug. 7, 2013

Instead of repelling each other, these alien climates, once in proximity, fuse, generate electricity and create an environment larger and more complex than the sum of its parts.

From New York Times • Nov. 6, 2011

Most Allied physicists had already been put to work developing radar and the proximity fuse, inventions of more immediate value.

From Time Magazine Archive

Together, they should make up a screen no proximity fuse bomb could pierce without exploding.

From Space Tug by Leinster, Murray

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