searching fire
- noun
- Specialized
:
fuego de cobertura
- Effective searching fire requires precise adjustment of gun elevations to cover the entire depth of a defensive line.
Examples
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By applying searching fire, the battery was able to suppress targets hiding at variable distances.
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During the operation, they called for a searching fire to secure the perimeter.
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The artillery commander ordered the use of searching fire to sweep the enemy's forward positions.
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The soldiers initiated a searching fire to cover the advancing enemy.
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The infantry team took cover while the artillery provided searching fire to keep the enemy at bay.
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To ensure safety during the assault, the commander ordered searching fire across the battlefield.
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In the tactical exercise, the troops practiced searching fire to effectively target hidden threats.
Synonyms
Artillery or mortar guns fire in one direction with changing elevation to hit different distances across a target area
Shots from many guns spread over an area to hit targets
Surface Forms
Morphology
A B1 learner who knows 'searching' and 'fire' can infer a general sense—gunfire intended to 'search' or probe an area—because the adjective-noun composition is compositional. However, the precise technical meaning (delivered over a range of elevations to cover an area in depth) is specialized and somewhat metaphorical, so the full sense is not wholly predictable without exposure.
Etymology
The noun searching fire comes from the image of guns moving their aim like a searchlight, where searching is the sweeping motion and fire is the shooting. That's why it means 'gunfire sent at different angles to sweep an area and hit targets at different distances'.
