whizz

The Economistに「Bullet v budget」という興味深い記事が載っています。「新幹線 対 格安航空」という意味ですが、同紙らしく経済面から日本で格安航空機ビジネスがなかなか根付かない理由を探っています。
whizzは「ヒューッと鳴る、いう，飛ぶ，（音を立てて）す早く動く、さっとやる」という擬声音からできた言葉で、whiz(z) kidはよく知られています。その単語が記事の中では「あっと言う間に運ぶ」という他動詞として使われています。（GP）
Transport in Japan
Bullet v budget
Can low-cost airlines beat bullet trains?
Apr 28th 2012

THE world’s busiest train route, and one of the busiest air routes, is between Tokyo and Osaka, Japan’s two biggest metropolitan areas. On that corridor, the shinkansen, as Japan’s bullet trains are known, were born in 1964. They whizz 120,000 passengers a day smoothly from one place to another, on trains that leave every ten minutes. Although humans, not robots, are at the controls, the average delay is a miraculous 36 seconds. To take all those passengers by air would require 667 aircraft, each with 180 seats, or five times Japan’s fleet of Boeing 737s, estimates Macquarie, an investment bank.
http://www.economist.com/node/21553488