1. To give birth before the fetus, an unborn offspring, is viable or capable of life; to have a miscarriage; to fail to be completed: It was very sad that the baby was aborted because of the injury when the mother fell down the stairs.
2. To cut short because of some failure in equipment: The pilot aborted the flight because of radio failure.

Failure of the radar system will abort the flight of the spaceship until another day.

The family will be aborting their trip to the arctic because of the early onslaught of winter.

3. Etymology: originally, "to set" or "to disappear" (as the sun). Composed of ab-, "from" + oriri- "to arise"; the part of the sky, or the world, in which the sun rises; the East.