Navaid

Help! I need somebody!

Today’s New York Times Spelling Bee letters:

D, H, I, K, N, W, and center V (all words must include V)

Silly little dictionary! Don’t you know navaid can’t possibly be a word if the New York Times says it ain’t?

The New York Times can’t feign ignorance about the word navaid. The term has appeared in at least one article in the venerable newspaper. Do I know this because I fervently went through their archives for several days in search of the any and all mentions of navaid, no matter how insignificant’

Of course not! Who has the time for that?

Our friends at Merriam-Webster provided all the assistance I needed with one of the example sentences they used underneath the definition:

The article was about the accident of an American Airlines Boeing 757 that crashed into the mountains of Colombia in December of 1995. The plane had 163 passengers and crew on board; only four survived. I know that because after reading the example sentence I did go to the New York Times website and checked their archives. I found only three articles, but the other two referenced people named Navaid.

Why was navaid rejected from the Spelling Bee list of accepted words in today’s game? Your guess is as good as mine. I’m sure there are plenty of Times readers who both know about boating (and therefore are familiar with the word) and play the game.

Some articles I read when doing my intense 15 minutes of online research spell navaid with all capital letters, like so: NAVAID. Maybe it’s because the term comes from the…

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