How to Use pilot light in a Sentence

pilot light

noun
  • That might be a sign that the pilot light on the heater has gone out.
    Los Angeles Times, 10 Jan. 2023
  • And then the pilot light jumped and my face caught on fire.
    Morgan Hines, USA TODAY, 1 Mar. 2023
  • And then the pilot light jumped, and my face caught on fire.
    Diana Dasrath, NBC News, 27 Jan. 2023
  • The clack-clack-clack of the pilot light led to a whoosh of flame coming to life.
    Washington Post, 1 May 2021
  • The bond market is a little like the pilot light on your furnace.
    Timothy Noah, The New Republic, 5 Oct. 2023
  • The pilot light of my identity, not a problem to be solved.
    Susannah Felts, Longreads, 27 Apr. 2023
  • The pilot light is what ignites the burner and starts the water heating process.
    Dallas News, 26 Jan. 2021
  • Canadians in the United States have the pilot light, too.
    Susan Morrison, The New Yorker, 5 Sep. 2021
  • Switch the pilot light and the gas valve off and wait for the fireplace to cool down completely before cleaning.
    Jessica Bennett, Better Homes & Gardens, 11 Oct. 2021
  • The first common reason could be because of your pilot light.
    Dallas News, 26 Jan. 2021
  • The wind kept blowing out the pilot light at one concession stand, for instance.
    Sarah Blaskovich, Dallas News, 28 Sep. 2020
  • The hot stove market, with 136 free agents still unemployed, barely has the flicker of a pilot light.
    Bob Nightengale, USA TODAY, 2 Jan. 2018
  • The control system for gas ovens couldn’t be equipped with a constant burning pilot light.
    By Mary Stroka | The Center Square Contributor , Washington Examiner, 5 Apr. 2023
  • Your pilot light is located at the bottom of your gas water heater tank.
    Dallas News, 26 Jan. 2021
  • All the families who tend that pilot light with love and tenacity.
    Susanna Schrobsdorff, Time, 10 Oct. 2021
  • Now, the violence in Ukraine seems to have revealed a pilot light in millions of people of all faiths worldwide.
    Ned Temko, The Christian Science Monitor, 25 Mar. 2022
  • The stretch of late winter that will inevitably lead to spring seemed more manageable somehow, like the pilot light has been reignited in my soul.
    New York Times, 19 Feb. 2020
  • Neighbors said police at the scene said the home was unheated due to flooding in the basement that extinguished the pilot light on the furnace.
    Miriam Marini, Detroit Free Press, 22 Jan. 2020
  • The late-career run that Nas has put together since 2020 — with Hit-Boy as his pilot light — is proof that time is truly a flat circle.
    Globe Staff, BostonGlobe.com, 16 Dec. 2022
  • That blow torch of a pilot light is an eternal flame in this state, but something feels different as July turns to August.
    Michael Casagrande | McAsagrande@al.com, al, 1 Aug. 2023
  • Our oven was child-size, akin to the Easy Bake variety, with a temperamental pilot light.
    Kaci Neves, Bon Appétit, 7 June 2021
  • All that’s required is a tiny spark—from a pilot light, or someone turning on a burner on a stove, even a thermostat switching on.
    Nathaniel Penn, Popular Mechanics, 3 June 2019
  • Called flaring, the technique involves burning natural gas that leaks from wells—much as a stove’s pilot light burns gas.
    Eric Niiler, WSJ, 29 Sep. 2022
  • Walter is his weird, grouchy OCD self, tinkering with the water heater pilot light, pacing and making noise.
    Erik Kain, Forbes, 16 Aug. 2022
  • The sound was the same as when a match touches the pilot light of a stove, only louder and deeper, a spasm of air expanding so fast and hard against the warehouse walls that the whole building shuddered and shook.
    Sean Flynn, Esquire, 9 Mar. 2017
  • Please explain what keeps your pilot light going on the inside to further growth, commitment and your purpose?
    Rod Berger, Forbes, 22 June 2022
  • Zhou and Loth continued to make improvements to the stove, adding a pilot light and making the stove more powerful and suitable for home backyard cooking.
    Rachel Ng, Outside Online, 15 Oct. 2021
  • This was the only gun in our recent test with an on/off pilot light, which is important for safety and saving energy.
    Roy Berendson, Popular Mechanics, 18 Mar. 2020
  • Now consider a train car, where a T-boning vehicle powered by a manmade fireball is what strikes the tank—and think about the size of the pilot light that ignites your stovetop and oven.
    Caroline Delbert, Popular Mechanics, 28 Aug. 2020
  • The balloon flew northeast along the Connecticut River, cruising for about 45 minutes before Boland reported that the pilot light on the burner was out.
    Fox News, 3 Aug. 2021

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

Last Updated: