Definition of "blast" []

• A very strong gust of wind or air. (noun)
• The effect of such a gust. (noun)
• A forcible stream of air, gas, or steam from an opening, especially one in a blast furnace to aid combustion. (noun)
• A sudden loud sound, especially one produced by a stream of forced air: a piercing blast from the steam whistle. (noun)
• The act of producing such a sound: gave a blast on his trumpet. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "IV. vii.155 (308,9) blast in proof] This, I believe, is a metaphor taken from a mine, which, in the proof or execution, sometimes breaks out with an ineffectual _blast_."
• "I grew up on a diet of stock-car racing at the long-defunct Walthamstow Stadium in the Sixties, and the term "blast from the past" could not be more apt."
• "People here say that the -- what they call blast walls, which are basically large concrete barriers, or large containers filled with dirt, had been erected in front of the embassy, and that those blast walls probably absorbed about 90 percent of the explosive impact of that suicide bomb."