Other forms: detonated, detonating, detonates
To detonate is to set off an explosion deliberately. Detonate the charge, it failed to detonate, detonated remotely.
In chemistry it means something exact: a detonation is a shock wave travelling faster than sound through the material, where a slower burn is called deflagration, and the difference decides whether you get a bang or a whoosh. The Latin means to thunder down.
1verbdetonateTo set off an explosion deliberately.
“The army detonated the old bomb in a safe place.”
detonate is an exploding.
Latin detonare means to thunder down, from de- plus tonare, to thunder. Thunder is a distant relative.
Proto-Indo-European
*(s)tenh₂-
Latin
dētonātus
French
détoner
English, today
detonate
Built from
1729; either French détoner or directly from Latin dētonātus, perfect passive participle of dētonō (“to thunder down (strongly); (figuratively, of a person) to thunder, speak threateningly, to rage; to stop thundering”) (see -ate), from dē- + tonō). Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European (s)tenh₂-. The current interlingual meaning seems to be a new formation in postclassical times (to thunder → make a large noise → explode), compare explode.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA