抢救
qiǎngjiù · HSK 5
rush to save
🚑 抢 (snatch) + 救 (rescue) = snatch-from-danger, i.e. rush to save
抢 means to snatch or grab urgently; 救 means to rescue or save. Together they describe emergency action — paramedics 抢救 a patient, firefighters 抢救 people from a blaze.
抢 — hand radical 扌 + 仓 cāng (granary)
A semantic-phonetic compound: the hand radical 扌 signals an action done with hands, while 仓 (granary) supplies the sound, originally close to qiāng/qiǎng. The early sense was to snatch or grab by force, which extended to 'rush, scramble for, vie for' in modern usage.
救 — 求 (seek/phonetic) + 攵 (strike/action)
A semantic-phonetic compound. The right side 攵 (a hand holding a stick) gives the action sense of intervening or stopping, while 求 supplies the sound 'jiu'. Originally meaning to halt or stop something bad, it extended to 'rescue, save, aid'.