sortie
Americannoun
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a rapid movement of troops from a besieged place to attack the besiegers.
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a body of troops involved in such a movement.
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the flying of an airplane on a combat mission.
verb (used without object)
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sorties,
present (3rd person singular)
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sortied,
past participle, past
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sortieing
present participle
noun
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(of troops, etc) the act of emerging from a contained or besieged position
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the troops doing this
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an operational flight made by one aircraft
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a short or relatively short return trip
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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sortiesimple
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sortiessimple
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have sortiedperfect
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has sortiedperfect
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am sortieingprogressive
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are sortieingprogressive
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is sortieingprogressive
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have been sortieingperfect progressive
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has been sortieingperfect progressive
Past
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sortiedsimple
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had sortiedperfect
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was sortieingprogressive
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were sortieingprogressive
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had been sortieingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of sortie
1680–90; < French, noun use of feminine past participle of sortir to go out
Explanation
When a group of soldiers is sent on a specific mission, it's called a sortie. A fighter pilot's sortie might involve a mission to drop a bomb on a target and return to base. When a fighting unit is deployed, heading out on a military mission, you can describe it as a sortie. A sortie might involve troops moving across a field toward their enemy, or a tank advancing on a city held by rebels. Sometimes a sortie involves a sudden surge or attack. In French, the word sortie literally means "a going out," from a Latin root, surgere, or "rise up."
Vocabulary lists containing sortie
National Spelling Bee '14: Prelims Round 2
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This Week in Words: May 11–17, 2019
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Tolkien Reading Day, List 6
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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:
“The near-zero sortie counts seen on some days since February should be viewed as an extreme manifestation of a longer-term trend, rather than a sudden development,” he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 12, 2026
Turk’s bad back makes it a brief sortie, but the attempt confirms that their friendship remains fundamentally intact.
From Salon ● Feb. 26, 2026
Air Marshal Brar felt that bond first-hand, flying his last sortie out of the northern city of Chandigarh just two days before his retirement in July 2000.
From BBC ● Sep. 24, 2025
But this time the Russian plane wasn’t on a bombing sortie.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 16, 2024
“Not a very well organized initial sortie for the invincible horde. Our chaps took the wind out of their sails, what?”
From "Redwall" by Brian Jacques
Japanese jets scrambled 595 times in the year to March 31, 2026, including 366 sorties against Chinese aircraft and 214 for Russian planes.
From Barron's ● Aug. 4, 2026
Indian air force helicopters flew several sorties rescuing hundreds of people, including foreign nationals.
From BBC ● Apr. 11, 2026
The F-15E jet fighter and A-10 attack plane were the first U.S. or Israeli aircraft to be shot down in thousands of sorties flown in Iranian airspace.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 4, 2026
Chinese military sorties around Taiwan also fell around 42 percent in January and February compared with the same period last year.
From Barron's ● Mar. 9, 2026
No doubt there had been sorties and skirmishes at the start of the siege, and arrows flying back and forth; half a year into it, everyone was too tired for such nonsense.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
The ROK Air Force then sortied its fighters, including about 80 fifth-generation F-35As.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 4, 2022
While his classmates flew long, bitterly cold patrols at the front that winter, young Stalin sortied into Moscow.
From Time Magazine Archive
Japan's main fleet never again sortied in full force.
From Time Magazine Archive
With an eye on relaxation as well as royalties, some well-established novelists and poets have sortied from their usual literary habitat and invaded the children's book field with happy results.
From Time Magazine Archive
When they came opposite the rock which had sheltered Johnny they sortied to see if that part of the mesa was guarded, but there was no sign of life upon it.
From Hopalong Cassidy by Mulford, Clarence E.
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.
