Definition of "alighting"

The Eagles are a dangerous 'machine'. I have used them sparingly, and that is the absolute limit of their credibility or usefulness. The alighting of a Great Eagle of the Misty Mountains in the Shire is absurd; it also makes the later capture of G. by Saruman incredible, and spoils the account of his escape.

1958 June, J. R. R. Tolkien, From a letter to Forrest J. Ackerman (#210)‎

We compared the frequencies of alightings on hosts with those predicted from random transect data.

1994, Leslie Real, Behavioral Mechanisms in Evolutionary Ecology, page 287

Load profiles are a standard analysis tool showing passenger activity (boardings, alightings) and passenger load at each stop along a route in a single direction.

2000, Peter Gregory Furth, Data Analysis for Bus Planning and Monitoring, page 24