Meaning

noun a military action in which besieged troops burst forth from their position

noun (military) an operational flight by a single aircraft (as in a military operation)

originPIE word *upó The noun is borrowed from French sortie (“act of exiting; exit, way out; (military) sally, sortie”), the feminine past participle of sortir (“to exit, go out”), from Old French sortir, from Latin sortīrī, the present active infinitive of sortior (“to cast or draw lots; to choose, select; to distribute, divide; to obtain, receive; to share”), from sors (“something used to determine…

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 3.0