Abort Meaning
/əˈbɔːt/Definition, CEFR level C1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
verbTo terminate or stop something before completion.
nounAn early termination of a mission, action, or procedure in relation to missiles or spacecraft; the craft making such a mission.
Sentence Examples
I don't want to abort the mission now.
"Yanni is coming." "Abort mission! Abort mission!"
CEFR Practice Quiz
Due to bad weather, the mission control decided to ____ the rocket launch.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The mission was ____ed after a leak was discovered in the tank.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English, from Latin abortus, perfect active participle of aborior (“miscarry”), formed from ab + orior (“to come into being”). Doublet of abortus.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"In Japonia 'tis a common thing to stifle their children if they be poor, or to make an abort, which Aristotle commends."
— 1624, Democritus Junior [pseudonym; Robert Burton], The Anatomy of Melancholy: […], 2nd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: […] John Lichfield and James Short, for Henry Cripps, →OCLC, partition I, section 2, member 4, subsection vi:
"Women have aborted, men have committed suicide, and both men and women have been thrown into convulsions during the fearful agony of renal colic."
— 1785, Henry Morris, Surgical Diseases of the Kidney, page 458:
"In the study group ll patients aborted spontaneously between the 17th and 20th gestational week and 8 patients aborted after the 21st week."
— 1983, M. D. Bennett, Chromosomes Today: Volume 8 Proceedings of the Eighth International Chromosome Conference, page 346:
""Of course, you can't abort yourself...I mean you positively can't be allowed to. To begin with it's a crime.""
— 1961, Xavier Herbert, Soldiers' Women, Netley, SA: Fontana Books, published 1978, page 236:
"First he aborts the take-off and now we have a runway incursion!"
— 2022, Michael & Stefan Strasser, Chicken Wings (comic):
Explore More C1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
Due to bad weather, the mission control decided to ____ the rocket launch.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
The mission was ____ed after a leak was discovered in the tank.