How to Use ordnance in a Sentence

ordnance

noun
  • The company was outfitted with 50-millimeter ordnance.
  • What salvage crews did bring up was ordnance.
    — Linda Dudik, San Diego Union-Tribune, 5 Dec. 2025
  • And at home, the land became littered with ordnance, the sea with spills of heavy oil.
    — Damien Cave, New York Times, 12 Apr. 2023
  • Another change in the ordnance would have ended what’s known as gate fees.
    — Christopher Harress | [email protected], al.com, 17 June 2019
  • Her grandfather died that day, not from the ordnance but from the shock that followed.
    — Los Angeles Times, 26 Apr. 2022
  • Deputies did not provide any other details about the ordnance.
    — Matthew Rodriguez, CBS News, 11 June 2026
  • Still the war ground on, and he was sent to Vietnam as an ordnance officer.
    — Washington Post, 18 Nov. 2021
  • In that time, more than eighteen million hours of labour produced some billion pounds of ordnance.
    — Amy Shira Teitel, Discover Magazine, 19 Mar. 2019
  • Pro-regime forces sent jets thundering overhead, and ordnance crashed down at random.
    — Anand Gopal, The New Yorker, 11 Mar. 2024
  • There are hundreds of hectares filled with mines and unexploded ordnance.
    — Oleksandr Chubko Mauricio Lima, New York Times, 10 May 2024
  • Rescue workers warned there could be unexploded ordnance and bombs in the area.
    — Steven Scheer, USA Today, 12 Oct. 2025
  • Rescue workers warned there could be unexploded ordnance and bombs in the area.
    — Kathryn Palmer, USA Today, 7 Oct. 2023
  • On a visit on Thursday, ordnance whizzed, thumped and boomed in all directions.
    — New York Times, 5 May 2022
  • The grenade in the shadow box was inert, but the other was believed to be a live military ordnance.
    — USA TODAY, 24 Oct. 2019
  • Instead, one of the men took the ordnance home and either left it in their truck overnight, or brought it into their house, the claim alleges.
    — Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times, 25 Mar. 2026
  • And aid groups had warned that the jungles of Kayah were now littered with unexploded ordnance.
    — Yan Naing, Washington Post, 7 Nov. 2023
  • Guy will not see the Verdun purged of unexploded ordnance in his lifetime.
    — Michael Jerome Plunkett september 5, Literary Hub, 5 Sep. 2025
  • The squadron’s ordnance handlers interpreted it to mean the cable should not be plugged in until the plane was parked on a flight deck.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 9 May 2023
  • From the ground around the command post protruded the fins of unexploded ordnance.
    — New York Times, 16 Jan. 2022
  • Most ordnance handlers understood that to mean it should not be plugged in until the plane was lined up on the catapult, ready to launch.
    — Kyle Mizokami, Popular Mechanics, 9 May 2023
  • As such, crews will need to safely clear the area of any unexploded ordnances before opening it up to the public.
    — Sarah Kuta, Smithsonian Magazine, 27 Mar. 2023
  • Even when combat ends in Ukraine's fields and towns, danger still lurks in the form of mines and unexploded ordnance.
    — Dominique Soguel, The Christian Science Monitor, 15 Nov. 2022
  • The site is closed to tourism due to unstable walls and concern about the presence of unexploded ordnance.
    — ABC News, 23 Mar. 2026
  • Both the rebels and the regime violated the terms of the truce, lobbing ordnance and explosive drones at each other.
    — The Economist, 5 Sep. 2019
  • So much of war depends on getting the right troops, transportation and ordnance together at the point of attack.
    — James Stavridis, Twin Cities, 24 May 2025
  • First responders weren't able to access the lot because there was still a significant amount of ordnance on the ground.
    — Emily Shapiro, ABC News, 16 Mar. 2021
  • In the following days, Japanese sorties rained ordnance on the port.
    — Peter Eisner, Smithsonian, 22 Aug. 2017
  • In the following days, Japanese sorties rained ordnance on the port.
    — Peter Eisner, Smithsonian, 29 Sep. 2017
  • The bomb squad secured the ordnance in a containment vessel and disposed of it in a secure location.
    — Julian Gill, Houston Chronicle, 6 Nov. 2019
  • When the Second World War approached, a great problem in naval ordnance was coming with it.
    — John McPhee, The New Yorker, 13 Jan. 2025

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

Last Updated: