Pontoon

Part of speech: noun (n.)

1. A wooden flat-bottomed boat, a metallic cylinder, or a frame covered with canvas, India rubber, etc., forming a portable float, used in building bridges quickly for the passage of troops.

2. A low, flat vessel, resembling a barge, furnished with cranes, capstans, and other machinery, used in careening ships, raising weights, drawing piles, etc., chiefly in the Mediterranean; a lighter. Pontoon bridge, a bridge formed with pontoons. -- Pontoon train, the carriages of the pontoons, and the materials they carry for making a pontoon bridge.