I’ve just watched an old tv show where the main character is tortured in someone’s basement with a live wire. The current is obviously flowing from the wire, through him and into the ground. Why does this not cause the fuse to blow?
I think this is probably just an error on their part, but I’m kinda curious now if that’s actually correct or not. I’m tempted to steal the idea for a book I’m writing but I’d need to know first whether or not that’s a valid method of torturing someone (never thought I’d find myself writing that sentence 😆).
In: 5
Fuses blow and breakers trip when you have more current flowing through them than what they are rated for. The amount of current needed to electrocute someone is far less than the amount needed to run a hair dryer or a microwave, so electrocution alone will probably not draw enough current to blow a fuse.
However, as others have mentioned, there are a few different ways to tell if something is wrong while still being under that threshold. An easy way to tell if something is wrong is a device that can detect live/ground differential, which will sense when current flows through the wrong path, which can trip a breaker but will not blow a fuse. But there is no guarantee anything other than a fuse has been installed, and in most homes that’s all you have.
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