drogue
/drəʊɡ
/noun
1A conical or funnel-shaped device with open ends, towed behind a boat, aircraft, or other moving object to reduce speed or improve stability.‘When a storm hits, we'll put the drogue out, batten down and see it out,’ said Tim....
- This led us to believe lighting had hit the HF-trailing-wire antenna and the drogue that drags the wire behind the aircraft was lost.
- The winch would have to have some kind of rewind capability and a small drogue to ensure it couldn't recoil into the tug's propeller.
1.1An object resembling a drogue, used as an aerial target for gunnery practice or as a windsock.Most of our aerial gunnery exercises consisted of firing at a drogue or target (a canvas cylinder approximately 12 feet long and 4 feet in diameter) which was towed about a hundred yards behind the single engined, high winged Lysander plane.
1.2(In tanker aircraft) a funnel-shaped part on the end of the hose into which a probe is inserted by an aircraft being refuelled in flight.The 767 aircraft can be modified to accommodate refuelling wingpods and a centreline hose for probe and drogue refuelling....
- A shuttlecock drogue can be trailed behind the boom and used to refuel aircraft equipped with refuelling probes.
- In the drill the second aircraft plugs its fuel connection pipe into the fuel drogue trailed by the lead aircraft.
1.3 (also drogue parachute) A small parachute used as a brake or to pull out a larger parachute or other object from an aircraft in flight or a fast-moving vehicle.For landing, a drogue parachute, installed in the tail of the fuselage, is connected to the spring loaded tail cone ejection plate....
- They would fly a few feet over the drop zone and then deploy the cargo using a small drogue parachute.
- The first results of the inspection of the payload and the analysis of telemetry and tracking data indicated that the drogue parachute did not succeed to pull the main parachute out of its canister.
Origin
Early 18th century (originally a whaling term denoting a piece of stout board attached to a harpoon line, used to slow down or mark the position of a harpooned whale): perhaps related to drag.