How to Use tugboat in a Sentence

tugboat

noun
Definition of tugboatnext
Synonyms for tugboatnext
  • She was placed on a barge and pulled to sea by tugboat.
    — San Diego Union-Tribune, 13 Mar. 2022
  • Then the team had a tugboat tow it out to an offshore site.
    — John Fialka, Scientific American, 28 Oct. 2020
  • The Dali backed away from the site and was escorted in by tugboats.
    — Joseph Wilkinson, New York Daily News, 20 May 2024
  • Covert is retired from the Navy, sailing the world on a tugboat.
    — Trevor Hughes, USA TODAY, 30 Sep. 2022
  • The bridge stands about 25 feet above the water, which is why even the tugboats couldn’t fit beneath it.
    — Paul Berger, WSJ, 2 June 2018
  • The crew detached the tugboat from the barge to break ice and forge a path back toward the Kuskokwim River.
    — Greg Kim, Anchorage Daily News, 12 Nov. 2021
  • It had been brought down the river from a quarry by one of three METS tugboats.
    — Patrick McGeehan, New York Times, 10 Oct. 2023
  • This improves safety on board both the vessel and the tugboat.
    — IEEE Spectrum, 14 Feb. 2020
  • They in turn will be led by tugboats, which can better steer at low speed.
    — Steve Mollman, Quartz, 8 June 2019
  • One of the tugboats, the Eric McAllister, turned around and raced back toward the ship.
    — Mike Baker, New York Times, 27 Mar. 2024
  • The ship was last seen near the pier, flanked by the two tugboats that helped it return from the site of the collision off the eastern coast of Japan.
    — Bloomberg.com, 17 June 2017
  • There was a tugboat shooting water with a fire hose and the Twin Towers in the background.
    — Jessica Matlin, Harper's BAZAAR, 7 Sep. 2021
  • So, yes, while the 1 weighs like a tugboat, much of that mass is slung deep and square in the midst of four insanely grippy tires.
    — Dan Neil, WSJ, 15 Oct. 2020
  • In 2012, Kuznetsov broke down off the coast of France and had to be taken under tow by a Russian navy tugboat.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 16 June 2022
  • After striking the buoy, the boat hit a tugboat, took on water and capsized, Cross said.
    — Jean Marbella, baltimoresun.com, 11 Oct. 2019
  • But the neighborhood changed, and in 1964 the members put the clubhouse on a barge, crewed up a tugboat and floated the club to China Basin.
    — Carl Nolte, SFChronicle.com, 9 Nov. 2019
  • Currence’s first kitchen job was cooking for a crew on a tugboat in the Gulf of Mexico.
    — Matt Wake | Mwake@al.com, al, 21 Jan. 2021
  • In another bay in the Nikopol District, 10 barges and a handful of tugboats lay tilting on their sides in the mud.
    — Carlotta Gall, New York Times, 11 June 2023
  • The tugboat in Texas was pushing bunker barges, which are fuel barges for ships, Flores said.
    — Juan Lozano, Fortune, 16 May 2024
  • Ed Whitmore, the owner of the tugboat pushing the barge, went to consult the captain, then returned.
    — Eric Lach, The New Yorker, 8 Apr. 2024
  • Some rescuers worked from a tent set up on the deck of a tugboat off the ship's stern, while smaller boats and helicopters buzzed around.
    — CBS News, 9 Sep. 2019
  • The USS Dewey, another destroyer, and two naval tugboats were at the scene.
    — Anna Fifield, Washington Post, 16 June 2017
  • Babb has access to a tugboat, and wonders if the family would like to see where Mitchell first found the bottle.
    — Zulekha Nathoo, USA TODAY, 4 Aug. 2022
  • Pamyua played while the sun set behind Mount Susitna and tugboats passed behind them.
    — Marc Lester, Anchorage Daily News, 29 Apr. 2020
  • The tugboat is completely overturned, and Spencer and Alexander are no where in sight.
    — Matt Cabral, EW.com, 6 Feb. 2023
  • After a series of mishaps over the course of months, a tugboat towing Kulluk through 35-foot seas in the Gulf of Alaska had to cut loose.
    — Tom Yulsman, Discover Magazine, 19 Jan. 2015
  • The Titan, for example, used a tugboat called the Polar Prince.
    — Manori Ravindran, Variety, 19 June 2023
  • In 1918, a barge-like vessel broke free from its tugboat and got lodged in the shallow rapids above Niagara Falls.
    — Brigit Katz, Smithsonian, 6 Nov. 2019
  • The United States confirmed a Ukrainian claim to have struck a Russian tugboat.
    — Amy Cheng, Washington Post, 18 June 2022
  • The pilot asked by radio for tugboats to help, ordered the Dali’s rudder turned hard and called for its anchor to be dropped.
    — William Wan, Washington Post, 30 Mar. 2024

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'tugboat.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Last Updated: