Word of the Month: Emplacement

 

David Zapatka

While watching the last two episodes of The Expanse, I heard significant dialogue about the rail guns being used by Marcos Inaros, the leader of the Belters’ Free Navy, who was intent on destroying the Inners (pronounced Innas), the people residing on Earth, Luna (the moon), and Mars. These rail guns were powerful weapons strategically set in emplacements near the ring entrance to the newly-discovered worlds.

Emplacement noun em·place·ment | im-ˈplā-smənt: 1. the situation or location of something 2. a prepared position for military weapons and radar equipment 3. a putting into position “a putting or fixing in place; a place or site” 4. Military sense of “the space within a fortification allotted for the position and service of a gun or battery” 5. Geology—the intrusion of igneous rocks into a particular position; the development of an ore deposit in a particular place.

Origin and Etymology—French, from Middle French emplacer to emplace, from en- + place

First Used—1742

Emplacement used in a sentence:

He heard the distant movement as attackers neared, the adjustment of the men’s emplacement, even the loading of arrows and stretching of bows.

This photograph shows an emplacement for an anti-aircraft gun.

Looking at the emplacement today, you would wonder why have an emplacement here in the first place?

Not the least extraordinary feature of the battle that followed is the part played by a sangar of stones at the head of Quarry Ravine and a small battery, called the Sandbag Battery, made as a temporary emplacement for two heavy guns a few days before.

Emplacement in the news:

The United States will send a shipment of weapons to Ukraine in the coming days. In addition, Sweden confirmed a second shipment of weapons to Ukrainian territory and NATO leaders will discuss the emplacement of four new multinational battalions in Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria—infobae.com, March 23, 2022

Panels are designed to be created and filled within approximately five years, but Panel 7 has taken much longer due to a radiological event in Room 7 that occurred in February 2014, shortly after emplacement began. That delayed emplacement until January 2017, as well as maintenance in the form of rock bolting. So in addition to the closure of Room 7, Rooms 6 and 4 had to be abandoned due to excessive salt movement—Waste Isolation Pilot Plant News, March 10, 2022

The plant is in the second phase of resuming normal operations after having slowed the emplacement of waste this spring when the pandemic began, said spokesperson Bobby St. John.—USA TODAY, Aug. 17, 2020

The base is built into subterranean caves, but concrete is still needed for the roofs and floors of the spacecraft hangars, and the defensive laser cannon emplacements.—Alastair Marsh, Quartz, Dec. 29, 2019

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