Indistinguishable in speech, the words hurtle and hurdle can be a confusing pair.
Hurtle is a verb with two meanings: "to move rapidly or forcefully," as in "The stone was hurtling through the air," and "to hurl or fling," as in "I hurtled the stone into the air." Note that the first use is intransitive: the stone isn't hurtling anything; it itself is simply hurtling. The second use is transitive: something was hurtled—in this case, a stone.
Hurdle is both a noun and a verb. As a noun, its most common meanings have to do with barriers: the ones that runners leap over, and the metaphorical extension of these, the figurative barriers and obstacles we try to similarly overcome. The verb hurdle has two meanings, and they are directly related to these. It can mean "to leap over especially while running," as in "She hurdled the fence," and it can mean "to overcome or surmount," as in "They've had to hurdle significant financial obstacles." The verb hurdle is always transitive; that is, there's always a thing being hurdled, whether it be a physical obstacle or a metaphorical one.
Boulders hurtled down the hill.
We kept to the side of the road as cars and trucks hurtled past us.
The protesters hurtled bottles at the police.
He hurtled himself into the crowd.
Recent Examples on the WebAfter Pakistani javelin athlete Arshad Nadeem hurtled his way into the Olympic history books, his country threw him welcome celebrations fit for a king.—Kimmy Yam, NBC News, 12 Aug. 2024 The rock, roughly the size of Mount Everest, hurtled toward Earth, traveling 15.5 miles per second (25 kilometers per second), according to NASA.—Kate Golembiewski, CNN, 16 Aug. 2024 But the powerful opening sequence of the trailer — which finds scientist Malcolm Lee and his children experiencing the apocalypse before a time-traveling soldier from 2022 comes hurtling into 1997 to try to prevent the Skynet AI from ending all of humanity — sets up the series nicely.—Mark Peikert, IndieWire, 31 July 2024 But instead, the mayor has sent this commission hurtling toward foregone conclusions to advance his agenda.—Jumaane Williams, New York Daily News, 25 July 2024 See all Example Sentences for hurtle
These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'hurtle.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
Etymology
Middle English hurtlen to collide, frequentative of hurten to cause to strike, hurt
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