thruster

English

Etymology

From thrust +‎ -er. The surfboard sense was coined (but never trademarked) by Simon Anderson, who created the design in 1980. The name was almost immediately applied generically to any surfboard with that fin design.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈθɹʌ.stɚ/
• Rhymes: -ʌstə(ɹ)

Noun

thruster (plural thrusters)

1. One who thrusts, who pushes or stabs.
   • 1978, Brian Inglis, The Book of the Back, page 109:

     Nevertheless osteopaths are coming to regard themselves not so much as thrusters, or even as repositioners, of bones, but as releasers of the patient's own recuperative forces.

2. A device for propelling an object, especially a spacecraft or a ship (marine vessel).
3. (nautical) A bow thruster or a stern thruster.
4. (surfing) A surfboard (usually a shortboard) with three fins of approximately equal size, one centred at the back, one on each side about 25cm forward and out near the rails.
5. An ambitious, driven person; a go-getter.
   • 1973, Director, volume 25, numbers 7-12, page 346:

     The executive is a thruster with ideas to expand or improve the business and his superiors fail to react—for whatever reason—and do not give acceptable explanations.

   • 2006, Robert Graham, How to Write Fiction (And Think About It), page 16:

     His hi-spec gear suggests that he's a corporate high-flyer and he's definitely a bit of a thruster, very much in control, taking care of business.

Hyponyms

• bow thruster
• Shkadov thruster
• stern thruster

Derived terms

• azimuth thruster
• microwave resonant cavity thruster
• pusher-thruster

 

Anagrams

• truthers