air marshal

7 4.9

A government officer who travels as a passenger to protect people on planes from hijacking

noun
/ɛr ˈmɑːrʃəl/

: agente de seguridad aérea

There's controversy around the air marshal program already.
federal air marshals
armed air marshals
undercover air marshals

And so the air marshals came very smart.

Examples

Our air marshal is going to escort you back to your seat.

Flightplan (2005)
There are three air marshals on board.

Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay (2008)
There were no federal air marshals aboard the aircraft.

Academic text (2008)
Since 9/11, we've put 4,000 air marshals in the sky.

Non-Stop (2014)
The air marshal monitored the passengers closely during the flight.
On each international flight, a trained air marshal is present to enhance security.
Travelers can feel safer knowing there is an air marshal on board ready to respond to threats.

Synonyms

sky marshal

vsair marshal

1 6.3

A police officer who travels secretly on planes to protect passengers from hijackers

is a government agent trained specifically to stop terrorist threats on flights

Surface Forms

air marshal singular

air marshals plural

Morphology

air + marshal

The compound is directly built from 'air' (aviation/air travel) + 'marshal' (a security or law-enforcement official), so a learner who knows both words can infer a security official associated with aircraft. This is a regular noun+noun composition found cross-linguistically, making the intended meaning (a marshal who works on flights) immediately accessible to B1 learners.

Etymology

Air marshal: The name air marshal comes from the idea of a marshal, a police officer, working in the air, meaning an officer who rides on airplanes. So an air marshal is a trained officer who travels as a passenger 'to protect' people on the plane from dangers like hijacking.