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Gust Beyond Wind
You're no doubt familiar with the simple gust that means "a brief burst of wind." At least a century and a half before that word first appeared in print in the late 16th century, however, a differently derived homograph came on the scene. The windy gust is probably derived from an Old Norse word gustr, whereas our older featured word (which is now considerably rarer than its look-alike) comes to us through Middle English from gustus, the Latin word for "taste." Gustus gave English another word as well. Gusto (which now usually means "zest" but can also mean "an individual or specific taste") comes to us from gustus by way of Italian.
Synonyms
Examples of gust in a Sentence
Haadiza Ogwude, The Enquirer, 17 Apr. 2024
The National Weather Service in Indianapolis is predicting blustery winds with gusts reaching 40 mph.
—Karl Schneider, The Indianapolis Star, 17 Apr. 2024
Friday will be mostly sunny with a high near 70 and wind gusts as high as 18 mph before the rain arrives.
—Sarah Linn, Sacramento Bee, 11 Apr. 2024
In addition to tornadoes, storms could also produce damaging wind gusts, flooding downpours and small hail.
—Kathryn Prociv, NBC News, 11 Apr. 2024
Only one or two wind gusts from the north or northwest near 25 mph — most breezes stay much lower than that, an improvement over Saturday.
—A. Camden Walker, Washington Post, 6 Apr. 2024
The Denver metro and Front Range are under a high wind warning starting Saturday morning, with forecasters predicting gusts of up to 100 mph in the foothills on Saturday.
—Katie Langford, The Denver Post, 5 Apr. 2024
Some of the heavier storms can produce flooding, hail, and brief strong wind gusts.
—Eric Lagatta, USA TODAY, 5 Apr. 2024
To further emphasize the similarities, on both days, as of 5 p.m. Saturday, the peak gust measured at an identical 38 mph.
—Martin Weil, Washington Post, 7 Apr. 2024
Robert A. Cronkleton, Kansas City Star, 1 Apr. 2024
The light west wind will increase to 6 to 11 mph in the morning and could gust as high as 21 mph.
—Haadiza Ogwude, The Enquirer, 29 Mar. 2024
Forecasters said there could be a couple of tornadoes, hail the size of quarters and scattered gusts up to 70 mph.
—Omar Rodríguez Ortiz, Miami Herald, 22 Mar. 2024
Winds die off fairly quickly with sunset but continue to gust around 10 mph through the night.
—Ian Livingston, Washington Post, 11 Mar. 2024
Winds gust around 25 to 30 mph in the midday and afternoon.
—Ian Livingston, Washington Post, 22 Mar. 2024
On Monday the storm will slow down and strengthen over the Upper Midwest, bringing continuous snow and strong wind gusts to the Dakotas and Minnesota.
—Mirna Alsharif, NBC News, 22 Mar. 2024
The storms expected to move through Indiana and Ohio could bring large hail and wind gusts up to 70 mph in addition to tornados, according to NWS.
—Jake Allen, The Indianapolis Star, 14 Mar. 2024
Temperatures will drop to 17 degrees Friday night and wind gusts up to 22 miles per hour are possible.
—Katie Langford, The Denver Post, 16 Feb. 2024
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'gust.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
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Cite this Entry
“Gust.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/gust. Accessed 23 Apr. 2024.
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