approaching

By surface analysis, approach +‎ -ing.

• (General American) IPA^(key): /əˈpɹoʊt͡ʃɪŋ/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /əˈpɹəʊt͡ʃɪŋ/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -əʊtʃɪŋ

approaching (not comparable)

1. That approaches or approach.

   the approaching armies

approaching (not comparable)

1. Nearly.
   • 2011 March 16, “There's more to fear from nature than nuclear power”, in Opinion, New Scientist:

     The evacuation of approaching 200,000 people, along with reports of high radiation levels, of burning spent fuel, and apocalyptic footage of plumes of debris erupting from the stricken plant, will revive a question that seemed to have been retreating from global concerns: how safe is nuclear power?

approaching

1. present participle and gerund of approach

   The army was approaching from the north.

approaching (plural approachings)

1. The act of coming closer; an approach.
   • 2011, Lance J. Rips, Lines of Thought: Central Concepts in Cognitive Psychology, page 168:

     But we can also take a more analytical attitude to these displays, interpreting the movements as no more than approachings, touchings, and departings with no implication that one shape caused the other to move.

• “approaching”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “approaching”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.