Tanker Meaning
/ˈtæŋkə/Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
nounA tankship, a vessel used to transport large quantities of fluid.
nounA motor truck (lorry) with a tank to hold bulk liquid (with or without internal baffles): a fuel tanker (lorry), petrol tanker, road tanker.
Sentence Examples
A huge tanker cast off just now.
A tanker is a ship carrying oil.
The tanker began to spill its cargo of oil.
CEFR Practice Quiz
The crew loaded the petroleum onto the ____ at the busy port terminal.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
A massive oil ____ was spotted off the coast as it was making its way toward the busy industrial harbor today.
Word Origin & History
Etymology tree Prakrit 𑀝𑀁𑀓 (ṭaṃka) Gujarati ટાંકી (ṭā̃kī)bor. Portuguese tanquebor. English tank Proto-Indo-European *-yósder. Proto-Italic *-āzijos Latin -āriusnom. Latin -āriusbor. Proto-Germanic *-ārijaz Proto-West Germanic *-ārī Old English -ere Middle English -ere English -er English tanker From tank + -er.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"The channel at Chan-chiang is being dredged to a depth of 50 feet enabling tankers of 70,000 tons to call."
— 1976 March, JeNelle Matheson, Construction Equipment A Market Assessment for the People's Republic of China, U.S. Department of Commerce, →OCLC, page 8:
"Nor is the government facing a strike by tanker drivers, as was the case in early 1979 during the winter of discontent."
— 2021 September 23, Larry Elliott, “Petrol disruption will fuel fears of new winter of discontent”, in The Guardian:
"On Friday night, eight US Air Force KC-135 Stratotankers took off from Altus, Oklahoma, according to data from FlightRadar24. Over Kansas the tankers refueled two groups of planes, identified on air traffic control audio by their callsigns MYTEE11 FLT and MYTEE21 FLT. The callsign MYTEE has previously been associated with special activity flights by B-2 bombers, and multiple flight trackers on social media said the planes being refueled were B-2 bombers out of Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri."
— 2025 June 21, Thomas Bordeaux, Natasha Bertrand and Zachary Cohen, “US moves B-2 bombers as Trump weighs Iran options”, in CNN:
"On February 19, 1943, American tankers felt the full wrath of the German Army in North Africa when its tank-led spearhead punched a 2-mile-wide hole through American lines at Faid Pass in Tunisia, […]"
— 2014, Michael Green, American Tanks & AFVs of World War II, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN, page 70:
Explore More B1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
The crew loaded the petroleum onto the ____ at the busy port terminal.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
A massive oil ____ was spotted off the coast as it was making its way toward the busy industrial harbor today.