cobra

plural cobras

1. Any of the genus Naja of venomous snakes that can spread their neck ribs into a broad hood when threatened; a true cobra.

   In the pools, too, was a species of small alligator or enormous iguana, I do not know which, that fed, Billali told me, upon the waterfowl, also large quantities of a hideous black water-snake, of which the bite is very dangerous, though not, I gathered, so deadly as a cobra's or a puff adder's.

   1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC

2. Certain other snakes of the family Elapidae.
   1. A ring-necked spitting cobra or rinkhals (Hemachatus haemachatus).
   2. A king cobra (Ophiophagus hannah).
   3. A tree cobra (genus Pseudohaje).
   4. A shield-nosed cobra/coral cobra (genus Aspidelaps).
   5. A black desert cobra (genus Walterinnesia).
   6. An American cobra (Micrurus fulvius).
3. A false water cobra, Hydrodynastes gigas.
4. A type of lanyard knot, thought to resemble a snake in its shape.

alternative Cobra

1. UKabbreviationinitialismgovernmentInitialism of Cabinet Office Briefing Room A.
2. UKabbreviationacronymbroadlygovernmentAcronym of Cabinet Office Briefing Rooms.

   Synonyms: COBR

3. USabbreviationinitialismlawInitialism of Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1985, especially the provision that allows some employees to continue their group-based health insurance after leaving a job; also, health insurance obtained under this law.

   There were COBRA forms to fill out for insurance, and unemployment to file for.

   2021, Ruth Ozeki, The Book of Form and Emptiness, Canongate Books (2022), page 478

plural COBRAs · alternative Cobra

1. UKbroadlygovernmentA cabinet committee meeting that would use a COBR room
2. UKbroadlygovernmentA cabinet committee that would meet using a COBR room

1. UKgovernmentAlternative letter-case form of COBRA.

   In the UK, a Cobra security meeting was called and in Estonia, which neighbours Russia, the prime minister, Kaja Kallas, said there was strengthened security on the border.

   2023 June 24, Pjotr Sauer, Andrew Roth, “Putin accuses Wagner chief of treason and vows to ‘neutralise’ uprising”, in The Guardian, →ISSN

   1 more example

   Boris Johnson was accused on Saturday of being “missing in action” after failing to attend a Cobra meeting to discuss the national heatwave emergency following predictions that thousands could die in the coming days.

   2022 July 16, Mark Townsend, James Tapper, “Johnson skips emergency Cobra meeting as experts warn thousands may die in UK heatwave”, in The Observer, →ISSN

2. rareA male given name.