Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A narrowly avoided collision involving two or more aircraft, ships, boats, or motor vehicles.
- noun A missile strike that is extremely close to but not directly on target.
- noun Something that fails by a very narrow margin.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun a
miss which was nearly ahit orcollision - noun by extension a scenario which ends safely but might well have ended in disaster
- noun by extension an attempt which fails narrowly; a performance which falls just short of a certain benchmark
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun an accidental collision that is narrowly avoided
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
[Blend of near thing and miss.]
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Examples
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MaryW commented on the word near miss
James B. Lieber, Killer Care: How Medical Error Became America's Third Largest Cause of Death, and What Can Be Done About It (New York: OR Books, 2015), Introduction
March 1, 2016