noun
COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES
a bomb threat (=when someone leaves a message saying there is a bomb somewhere)
▪ He delayed his flight home because of a bomb threat.
a death threat (=a threat to kill someone deliberately)
▪ The writer had received a number of death threats.
a health risk/hazard/threat (=something that could damage your health)
▪ The report looked at the health risks linked to eating excess sugar.
a potential danger/threat/risk
▪ Tired drivers are a potential danger to other road users.
a serious threat
▪ In the developed world, over-consumption is now a serious threat to health.
a suicide threat (=when someone says that they will kill themselves)
▪ Depression may sometimes lead to suicide threats.
credible threat/challenge/force etc
▪ Can Thompson make a credible challenge for the party leadership?
idle threats
▪ She was not a woman to make idle threats.
imminent danger/threat/death/disaster etc
▪ He was in imminent danger of dying.
implicit criticism/threat/assumption
▪ Her words contained an implicit threat.
pose a threat/danger/risk
▪ The chemical leak poses a threat to human health.
present a threat
▪ The disease presents a grave threat to the livestock industry.
the terrorist threat
▪ He admitted the increased terrorist threat was causing the security forces great concern.
under threat
▪ Two of our national parks are currently under threat from road schemes.
COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS
■ ADJECTIVE
big
▪ Ashes without phoenix Whatever the president decides in June, the biggest threat to a slimmer space station will be Congress.
▪ The latter tWo were not viewed as big threats.
▪ Interbreeding with feral cats is probably the biggest threat to the wildcat.
▪ Indeed, earnings worries represent the biggest threat to the bull market.
▪ The biggest threat to standards remains the state of the economy.
▪ What may be the biggest threat for most farmers is the length of time standing water remains on their fields.
▪ The biggest threat to this cosy world comes from within.
▪ Far better to spend some money exploring this new medium than to ignore the biggest competitive threat since television.
constant
▪ The small village appears to be under constant threat of a landslide from the steep slopes immediately behind.
▪ They lived under constant threat of exposure and extermination at the hands of the Inquisition, which monitored Christians' piety.
▪ The immediate past and the constant threat was poverty.
▪ Individual feelings and complexities are repressed and there is a constant threat of mutiny among family members.
▪ He was impeccable in defence, and posed a constant threat to the Springboks' defensive wall.
▪ They governed during the Cold War, with the constant threat of nuclear war.
▪ Moscow did not falter under the onslaught and their counter-attacking potential was a constant threat.
▪ The strain of working long hours under the constant threat of robbery took its toll on the family.
great
▪ It had previously been thought that pollution posed the greatest threat to inshore marine mammals.
▪ Newspapers are under the greatest peacetime threat to their freedom this century.
▪ Nevertheless, its greatest threat comes not only from coal imports but from the Labour party.
▪ Either way, it represents the greatest environmental threat the world now faces.
▪ He said spiralling public sector borrowing was the greatest threat to a sustained economic recovery.
▪ And this may be the greatest threat to our reserves of groundwater.
▪ Disturbance and high tides pose the greatest threats to the breeding birds.
immediate
▪ My tardiness prompted an immediate threat of a fine, but it never materialised.
▪ The contamination does not pose any immediate public health threat because none of the seed has been planted.
▪ The immediate threat to the West may be inflation; the spectre in the shadows is deflation.
▪ The most immediate threat is to bird life.
▪ Officials said there was no immediate threat of tsunami, a seismic ocean wave, which could be catastrophic to the area.
▪ Although the gunman had her pinned down he wasn't her immediate threat.
▪ The creation of States posed an immediate threat to the freedom of action of lesser rulers.
imminent
▪ Most local papers are sympathetic to heritage stories and will give space to them, particularly if there is an imminent threat.
▪ Detain any person who poses an imminent threat of death or serious bodily harm.
▪ We face no imminent threat, but we do have an enemy.
major
▪ Public sector pay and the unpredictability of pay settlements have always posed a major threat to public expenditure control.
▪ But workers here are accustomed to lifetime employment and see the provisions as a major threat to their job security.
▪ Leicester City are the major threat to Boro's hopes, especially after a last-kick injury-time matchwinner against Tranmere Rovers.
▪ Losing the existing business was his major threat.
▪ For this reason fears have been expressed that rising house prices pose a major threat to price stability generally.
▪ The Christmas holiday, which is eight months away, will be another major threat to the system, analysts said.
▪ Policy choices reflected what governments perceived as the major threats to the cohesion and survival of the state.
military
▪ He further stated that the military threat from the Soviet Union was at its lowest level since 1945.
▪ Pete Wilson successfully transformed the image of the industrious immigrant into a military threat.
▪ We do not face outside military threats.
▪ Second, it could prevent us from dealing expeditiously with emergencies such as natural disasters or military threats.
▪ It would make more sense economically to bring them home, and would not create any military threat.
▪ Each country regarded the other as a major military threat.
potential
▪ The raven was determined to fend off any potential threat and maintain its fiefdom of Edge Wood.
▪ And the success of actions in these circumstances would serve to reduce the potential long-term threat associated with the event.
▪ But he did okay in our program, handling its challenges and its many potential threats.
▪ They regarded it either as virtually impossible to implement, or as a potential threat to themselves at the elections.
▪ Many see computers as a potential threat to their livelihood.
▪ Recent newspaper reports have highlighted the potential threat to Britain when the Channel Tunnel links us with the Continent.
▪ The scientists warn of the potential threat to towns, beaches, golf courses, marinas and nature reserves along the coast.
real
▪ On form Cambridge look a real threat.
▪ Any team capable of getting this far had to be considered a real threat.
▪ They have no finishers or real scoring threat besides Owen Nolan, who has six goals.
▪ Small businesspeople in particular see the growing welfare population as a real and present threat to their future.
▪ Inflation running at 57 %, record unemployment, rampant corruption and real threats to democracy.
▪ Somehow they were more terrible than the real threat of the oozing wounds across his back.
▪ The real threat was more substantial, and imminent.
▪ But Chris's smile shows he clearly doesn't see any real threat to his golden 4,000 metres record.
serious
▪ Of these, logging poses by far the most serious threat.
▪ In this sense, the guns have a virtually religious import, and gun restrictions pose a serious psychological threat.
▪ Perhaps the argument that constituted the most serious threat to Copernicus was the so-called tower argument.
▪ His testimony presented a serious political threat to the incumbents on the city council and alienated Leroy from their affections.
▪ This search for a medical solution, then, may present a serious threat to civil liberties.
▪ The embryonic plot appeared to have been an amateurish operation which did not pose a serious threat to the government.
▪ Moreover, sunken waste containers could pose a serious threat over time as they begin to leak.
soviet
▪ In 1954 Britain had fostered the Baghdad Pact to create a band of friendly pro-Western states against the Soviet threat.
▪ The Alsops' war with Truman and Johnson centered on disagreements about the nature of the Soviet threat.
▪ Briefly At last we've found a convenient enemy to replace the Soviet threat.
▪ And, at bottom, what was the nature and extent of the Soviet threat and how should it be met?
▪ There is, after all, very little risk in defying the United States now that the Soviet threat is history.
▪ A Bevanite pamphlet appeared in July which argued - among other things - that the government was exaggerating the Soviet threat.
▪ In his view the Soviet threat was primarily political.
■ NOUN
bomb
▪ Pervez Musharraf, delayed his flight home because of a bomb threat.
▪ More than 50, 000 people carrying free foam-rubber tomahawks evacuated the stadium as if there had been a bomb threat.
▪ Many passengers switch flight after bomb threat.
▪ Last Thursday, campus officials received a bomb threat that was sent over the university e-mail system.
▪ Schools cancelled extracurricular activities, and many parents took their children out of classes after word of the bomb threat spread.
▪ Last Monday, a bomb threat against the county courthouse was delivered by telephone.
▪ It belongs to the man who called in the bomb threat 18 minutes before it detonated.
death
▪ Employees and shareholders have also received death threats and hate mail.
▪ Vince Tobin withdrew his candidacy for the job after both men got death threats from Ditka fanatics.
▪ He has received death threats after cheating hundreds of innocent people.
▪ Then came the death threats against Krueger himself, then the ambush of a convoy in which he was traveling.
▪ Teachers supporting their local community's campaigns have also been subject to death threats.
▪ J., was scrubbed because the promoter got death threats.
▪ They have found themselves the targets of death threats and kidnappings as a result.
▪ His family said he had been subjected to a campaign of racial harassment and death threats.
■ VERB
become
▪ We human beings ourselves have become a threat to our planet.
▪ This guy has become the offensive threat Lute and the other coaches have been talking about for the past three years.
▪ But I can see him becoming an instant threat in the Intercontinental division.
▪ Eventually, however, Skinner hopes to become an even bigger threat on the Cup circuit.
▪ This becomes a threat when the information in the marketplace is about humans, and private.
▪ It has become a pure threat signal rather than just the first stage of an attack.
▪ At this time localism had not yet become a threat.
▪ Current world trade agreements have become the foremost threats to democracy on earth.
carry
▪ There was no way to prevent White from carrying out his threat of f6.
▪ If Walden carries out his threat, the Tory government would fall, leading to a general election.
▪ There was nothing to stop the guy carrying out his threat to put the husband wise about Laura's past.
▪ Charles wondered if Alex Household had carried out his threat of feeding the wrong lines.
▪ Accordingly, on Oct. 22, Bush carried out his threat to veto the bill.
▪ Whether companies would carry out their threat to emigrate is debatable, with the huge costs that it would entail.
▪ Maybe she ought to have carried out her threat to go to the police.
▪ The question of whether the workers wish to co-operate becomes secondary as unwillingness carries with it the threat of losing their jobs.
counter
▪ Both the level of available resources and their deployment are constantly adjusted as necessary to counter the foreseeable threat.
▪ They countered the threat by inviting only safe theologians - largely Rome-based - to sit on the preparatory commissions.
▪ Edward's first move was to counter any possible threat to Aquitaine from the south and from the sea.
face
▪ Whalers face the threat of government reprisals should they start a commercial hunt which has been banned since 1985.
▪ Its cold-blooded use by cops facing no threat to themselves is plainly inhumane.
▪ We do not face outside military threats.
▪ Augustine says some of those patients may be facing collection agency threats.
▪ The 45 grammar schools among them face the additional threat of comprehensive reorganisation, or closure.
▪ Offenders will then face the threat of prosecution.
▪ If young men are estranged from the leadership of society, any society faces a threat from its young men.
issue
▪ Yet the Mugabe government repeatedly issues public death threats against its foes.
▪ The greater its dependence on others, the less its ability to issue credible threats or to mobilise for sustained hostilities.
▪ It was only by issuing rather unconvincing threats of his disapproval that Peggy could keep the girl in line.
▪ For one sweaty moment I was sure it would be Famlio, about to issue dire threats and promises.
▪ His favourite line of attack was to start talking about finding useful employment for Vincent, and to issue veiled threats.
meet
▪ Sandwich was better situated to meet a threat from Scandinavia.
▪ The army sent to meet this threat was decimated at Adrianople: the road to Rome now lay open to the barbarians.
▪ Thus the notion of security requires reformulation in terms of satisfaction of human needs: weapons can not meet the threat of starvation.
▪ The Army wanted enough flexibility to be able to meet the Communist threat at any level.
▪ In order to meet these threats, a warrior caste developed under the command of a chieftain or king.
▪ The lower bird turned momentarily upside-down to meet the threat from the larger, more agile predator with its outstretched talons.
▪ The intervention represented by the Newsboys' House, which your generosity made possible, can not suffice to meet this threat.
perceive
▪ This was perceived as a threat to the Plantagenets in Aquitaine.
▪ They damned the no-nonsense, authoritarian government, which peremptorily squashed even the smallest perceived threat to social peace.
▪ Events and situations that you perceive as threats or challenges are called stressors.
▪ And like all perceived threats, the dangers are inflated.
▪ The children targeted were a public eyesore, nuisance, or perceived threat.
pose
▪ He posed no threat to anyone.
▪ In this sense, the guns have a virtually religious import, and gun restrictions pose a serious psychological threat.
▪ However, if demand falls collective action poses less of a threat, and may even be beneficial.
▪ Some fear that substances used in the process remain in the beans and could pose a health threat.
▪ The embryonic plot appeared to have been an amateurish operation which did not pose a serious threat to the government.
▪ Secondly, the packaging plastics themselves can pose a medical threat.
▪ This still, however, posed a threat to Stanley influence.
▪ Disturbance and high tides pose the greatest threats to the breeding birds.
present
▪ The advance of the disease presents a grave threat to the livestock industry.
▪ Because the early runoff of snow, heavy rains later in the year presented less threat of floods.
▪ This search for a medical solution, then, may present a serious threat to civil liberties.
▪ The Rams also present an inside threat with 6-2 senior Teresa James.
▪ Despite the foundation of the small national Independent Labour Party in 1893, Labour did not appear to present an irresistible threat.
▪ Women first are presented as bloodsucking threats, then impaled with gusto.
▪ Surely he presented no physical threat to anyone, but it was possible that he had knowledge that was threatening.
▪ His testimony presented a serious political threat to the incumbents on the city council and alienated Leroy from their affections.
receive
▪ Employees and shareholders have also received death threats and hate mail.
▪ Since Waco, agents have received so many threats that the bureau has established a computer database to track and analyze them.
▪ He has received death threats after cheating hundreds of innocent people.
▪ Last Thursday, campus officials received a bomb threat that was sent over the university e-mail system.
▪ The judges have received death threats.
▪ Capistran says his family received phone threats from authorities.
▪ The judges have received death threats and been excoriated in the state press by Mugabe and ministers.
▪ And some people have even received threats.
reduce
▪ To reduce these security threats, various protection methods are used.
▪ And the success of actions in these circumstances would serve to reduce the potential long-term threat associated with the event.
▪ Meantime, the government is already spending less, helping to reduce the threat of inflation and lifting bonds.
▪ That would reduce the threat not just to tigers, but also to rhinos, bears, pangolins and many others.
represent
▪ If it is the postman, introduce them; let him know this man represents no threat.
▪ Indeed, earnings worries represent the biggest threat to the bull market.
▪ We are envious of others who have power because they represent a threat.
▪ Unfriendly takeovers represent a constant threat to underperforming companies with ill prepared strategic plans.
▪ Either way, it represents the greatest environmental threat the world now faces.
▪ The neighbor or newcomer of a different faith or way has always represented a threat or an opportunity to those already here.
▪ Similarly, mimicry of the expressions, stance and actions of a truly violent encounter can represent an intention or threat.
PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
vain threat/promise etc
EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES
▪ After the floods, contaminated water was a serious threat to public health.
▪ Global warming poses a serious threat for the future.
▪ He denied making threats to kill her.
▪ He showed no sign of carrying out his threat of making them pay.
▪ I'm prepared to listen to him, but I'm not going to respond to threats.
▪ Immigrant families in the area have received threats from right-wing extremist groups.
▪ It's nonsense to say that the protesters pose any threat to democratic society.
▪ Once again the people of Sudan face the threat of famine.
▪ She claims she received anonymous death threats after she gave evidence in the trial.
▪ The threat of inflation and high interest rates led to a wage freeze.
▪ the threat of invasion
▪ The latest outbreak of the disease can be seen as the greatest threat to UK farmers yet.
▪ The nuclear threat, while not gone completely, is reduced.
▪ There is a threat that the violence will break out again.
▪ Tuberculosis is a common threat when people live in crowded conditions.
▪ Your threats don't scare me!
EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS
▪ And there has emerged another threat.
▪ Bad weather is a regular threat.
▪ But below the mirror images of arts and architecture lurks the threat of extinction - Venice is in Peril.
▪ The contamination does not pose any immediate public health threat because none of the seed has been planted.
▪ There's no guarantee that whoever sent it won't follow up those written threats with actual physical violence.
▪ These two, plus Jones, Botham and Bainbridge, will pose a strong threat to any attack.