vortical

[vawr-ti-kuhl]

adjective

1. of or relating to a vortex.

2. suggesting or resembling a vortex.

3. moving in a vortex.

Other Word Forms

• vortically adverb

Word History and Origins

Origin of vortical¹

1645–55; < Latin vortic- (stem of vortex vortex ) + -al ¹

Example Sentences

“A demented and seductive vortical tension was building in the community. The jitters were setting in,” she writes.

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The tallest peak in Indonesia, Tambora exploded in April 1815, consuming whole villages in “a vortical hell of flames, ash, boiling magma and hurricane-strength winds.”

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But if the current of their conversation had been vortical and crowded, the outcome was perfectly clear.

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This return will then take the form of violent storms of wind, usually of a cyclonic nature, and affording direct evidence of the tendency of the air masses to pursue vortical paths in their movement towards lower levels.

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On the contrary, they may and do move both towards the poles and downwards by circuitous and even vortical paths.

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Related Words

• whirling www.thesaurus.com