fishtail

plural fishtails

1. The tail of a fish, or an object resembling this.
2. The skidding of the back of a vehicle from side to side.
3. A kind of chisel with a flared blade.
4. abbreviationellipsisEllipsis of fishtail palm.

present singular third person fishtails · participle present fishtailing · participle past fishtailed · past fishtailed

1. intransitiveTo swing the back of a vehicle (originally an aircraft) from side to side.

   As we approached the runway, the pilot fishtailed slightly to reduce landing speed.

2. transitiveTo cause the back of (a vehicle) to swing from side to side.

   But Bruce wasn't done baiting the jocks. He fishtailed the car; it swerved and reversed direction, heading straight for the three jocks who were chasing them on foot. It looked like he was going to run the car over the three men.

   2013, Jeffrey Bernhardt, The Indian: America's Waking Dream, Berkeley Radicals, War, Riots, Drugs and Revolution

3. intransitiveTo move with the tail swinging from side to side in this way.

   She'd sprinted away like Betty Cuthbert and the blue F.J. Holden was fishtailing up the street as fast as it could go.

   1995, Paul Vautin, Turn It Up!, Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia, page 99

   2 more examples

   A large black and gold butterfly fish-tailed in and landed on a hydrangea bush almost at my elbow, moved its wings slowly up and down a few times, then took off heavily […]

   1943, Raymond Chandler, The High Window, Penguin, published 2005, page 3

   Having reversed at Eastbourne, I am in the trailing car, which leaps and fishtails around so much on our way to Bexhill that I have trouble writing coherent notes.

   2022 November 16, Paul Bigland, “From rural branches to high-speed arteries”, in RAIL, number 970, page 55