Definition of COMBUSTING

Examples of combust in a Sentence

anthracite, which is naturally hard, combusts more cleanly than bituminous coal

Recent Examples on the Web

If the air is already tightly compacted and the turbo forces in even more, then the air (once mixed with fuel vapor) can combust unpredictably. — Matthew Jancer, Popular Mechanics, "How Infiniti's Variable-Compression Engine Works," 16 July 2018 Mineral oil, in turn, combusts explosively and rockets transformer scything into the air. — Cassie Rodenberg, Popular Mechanics, "How Transformers Can Explode," 28 Dec. 2018 The Environmental Protection Agency assumed unproven technologies would be widely adopted, but many have stalled or combusted. — The Editorial Board, WSJ, "Trump’s Car Freedom Act," 3 Aug. 2018 These springs keep engine valves closed when the fuel is being combusted. — Sean Mclain, WSJ, "Subaru and Toyota to Recall More Than 400,000 Vehicles Globally," 1 Nov. 2018 Combined with carbon and oil sediment the leaks could combust and cause fires when the vehicles were driven at high speeds for long periods of time. — Kim Tong-hyung, The Seattle Times, "South Korea bans driving BMWs under recall due to fires," 14 Aug. 2018 One woman was in her car when her vaporizer combusted, causing the entire vehicle to go up in flames. — Caroline Picard, Good Housekeeping, "Yet Another Person Has Been Injured From an Exploding E-Cigarette," 14 June 2016 The motion turns a set of gears that drop feces and urine into a pan, where they are separated and either combusted into ash that can be thrown away or filtered into clean water that could be used to water plants, for instance, though not drinking. — Dominique Fong, WSJ, "Flush With Ideas: Bill Gates Pursues the Toilet of the Future," 9 Nov. 2018 The leak took months to seal, becoming the second largest methane leak in US history but likely the most environmentally damaging methane leak in US history due to the fact that none of the methane combusted before being released to the atmosphere. — Megan Geuss, Ars Technica, "In California, natural gas availability still an issue 3 years after major leak," 10 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'combust.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

History and Etymology for combust

derivative of earlier combust, combusted "burned, consumed," going back to Middle English combust, borrowed from Latin combustus, past participle of combūrere "to destroy with fire, reduce to ashes, calcine," from com- com- + ūrere "to expose to fire, burn, scorch" (with -b- from ambūrere "to burn around, scorch," falsely parsed as am- + būrere) — more at adust

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