washaway

See also: wash away

English

Etymology

Deverbal from wash away.

Noun

washaway (plural washaways)

  1. (chiefly Australia) The washing away of earth, a road, structure etc. by flood, or the channel caused by this. [from 19th c.]
    Synonym: (North America) washout
    Coordinate term: slipout
    • 1956 October, “Summer Floods in Scotland”, in Railway Magazine, page 656:
      The first report of damage was received at 5.45 a.m. on Monday, July 30, when there was a slight washaway of the bank on the down side of the line two miles north of Daviot station, and subsequently further damage was reported between Inverness and Daviot. Shortly afterwards, a washaway occurred on the line between Dunphail and Dava, and this route was closed to all traffic from 10.30 a.m. until 3.30 p.m.
    • 2006, Alexis Wright, Carpentaria, Giramondo, published 2012, page 145:
      It was the giddy sight down the gullies below the twisting road which had been formed and re-formed from years of washaways, and now hung like fish gills, out over edges of the limestone substrata.
This article is issued from Wiktionary. The text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.