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 😆).
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An RCD would blow – this is a device that measures the difference in electricity on the live and neutral wires. If there’s a difference then it means some electricity is flowing to ground and the RCD trips. Many countries mandate these on household wiring. However they are easy to bypass if you had malicious intent. These are designed to trip at a very small imbalance and are very important for safety.
A fuse however only blows if the current is above a high level (often for a sustained period of time too). The human body isn’t that conductive (not compared to a copper wire anyway), and the current wouldn’t be high enough in most situations. The body’s resistance is orders of 100’s of ohms – so the current would be fractions of an Amp. Most fuses require 10’s of Amps to blow.
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