flipper
/ˈflɪpə
/noun
1A broad flat limb without fingers, used for swimming by various sea animals such as seals, whales, and turtles.Modern sirenians (manatees and dugongs) are large, docile, aquatic herbivores that have flippers for forelimbs and no hind limbs....
- With a few broad strokes of its flippers, the turtle I've nabbed tows me along under the shallow water until I find my feet, only to be pulled off them again as the powerful creature yanks me forward.
- The forelimbs are specialized to form flippers, and the hind limbs and pelvis are extremely small and do not normally extend out of the body wall of the animal.
1.1A flat rubber attachment worn on the foot for underwater swimming.Customers can also win a pair of Turkey feet - like rubber flippers....
- Crunching awkwardly over the broken glass (her father's shoes were like flippers on her feet) she peered down at the brick and saw that there was a piece of paper wrapped around it.
- Sure, people noticed the flipper attached to the prosthesis on his left leg.
1.2A pivoted arm in a pinball machine, controlled by the player and used for sending the ball back up the table.The machine resembles a vertical pinball box without the flippers to control the dropping of the ball from top to bottom - the only control is the powerflicker, with which you can propel the balls faster or slower into the box....
- Bumper is a very playable pinball game where you control the flippers on a virtual pinball machine.
- Gaspard's also boasts an original pre-impressionist juke box, complete with scratchy Sartrean torch songs by Greco and Piaf, and a pinball machine whose left flipper has been bust since Stevenson's day.
