pilot boat
- noun
- /ˈpaɪlət boʊt/
- Specialized
:
barco piloto
- Especially interesting to me was hearing the two Yakutat Tlingit tribal representatives (they had boarded the Oosterdam at the mouth of Yakutat Bay via pilot boat and left the ship when we returned to the same spot) tell of their tribe.
Examples
-
By the beginning of 1776, he and twenty-two skilled slaves operated a number of pilot boats in the ports of Savannah and Sunbury in Georgia and Port Royal in South Carolina.
Academic text (2007) -
Lyford immediately bought a new pilot boat, a thirty-two-foot schooner-rigged named the Favorite, and moved from Charles Town to Cockspur Island in the Savannah River near its entrance into the ocean.
Academic text (2007) -
A pilot boat came.
-
This massive vessel had probably been towed by a pilot boat to its anchorage on the lake.
Academic text (2002) -
My first job in the business was to ride the pilot boats out to Sandy Hook and try to get the European news from the transatlantic ships before anybody else.
Fiction book (1994) -
After lengthy advertisements in Charles Town and Savannah newspapers and offers of a reward failed to recover the pilot boat, the Georgia Assembly voted him $100 for the building of a new one, with the condition that he remain as pilot in Georgia for at least two years.
Academic text (2007) -
The pilot boat rushed to transport the maritime pilots to the large cargo ship arriving at the harbor.
-
As the freighter approached the port, the pilot boat was dispatched to guide it safely through the busy waters.
-
The captain watched the pilot boat navigate through the waves to reach the anchored vessel.
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'a boat used to transport maritime pilots' is directly and compositionally derived from 'pilot' (a person who guides a vessel) + 'boat' (a small vessel), forming a standard noun compound that denotes purpose or association. This is a common cross-linguistic pattern and even if a learner first thinks of an aircraft pilot, the compound context makes the maritime reading inferable, so a B1 learner who knows both words can grasp the meaning.
Etymology
Pilot boat shows a simple scene: a small boat carrying a pilot, an expert who goes out to meet big ships to 'guide' them into port. That's why it means a boat used to bring maritime pilots to and from large ships.
