Word.ws English Dictionary

flying off the handle

flying off the handle is the present participle and gerund of fly off the handle.

Meaning of fly off the handle

Verb

fly off the handle (third-person singular simple present flies off the handle, present participle flying off the handle, simple past flew off the handle, past participle flown off the handle)

  1. (colloquial, idiomatic) To become very angry or enraged; to throw a fit or go crazy.
    • My dad flew off the handle when he saw the F grade on my report card.

Questions about flying off the handle

What is flying off the handle the present participle and gerund of?
Flying off the handle is the present participle and gerund of fly off the handle.

Words near flying off the handle in the dictionary

  1. flying mice
  2. flying monkeys
  3. flying mouse
  4. flying off
  5. flying off at a tangent
  6. flying off the handle
  7. flying off the shelves
  8. flying officer
  9. flying officers
  10. flying ointment
  11. flying out

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: flying off the handle (page history and authors); fly off the handle (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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