lightning arrester

American  

noun

1. a device for preventing damage to radio, telephonic, or other electric equipment from lightning or other high-voltage currents, using spark gaps to carry the current to the ground without passing through the device.

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lightning arrester British  

noun

1. a device that protects electrical equipment, such as an aerial, from an excessive voltage resulting from a lightning discharge or other accidental electric surge, by discharging it to earth

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Etymology

Origin of lightning arrester

First recorded in 1855–60

Example Sentences

A lightning arrester no bigger than a quart-size fruit jar receives the bolt, discharges it harmlessly through its coils.

From Time Magazine Archive

The fault was found in a lightning arrester which one of the operators had neglected in the cable hut.

From A Woman's Journey through the Philippines On a Cable Ship that Linked Together the Strange Lands Seen En Route by Russel, Florence Kimball

Stumbling through the débris that covered the floor, Bucks made his way to the operator’s table and put his hand up to cut in the lightning arrester.

From The Mountain Divide by Both, Armand

To protect the house and your apparatus from lightning insert a fuse and a little carbon block lightning arrester such as are used by the telephone company in their installations of house phones.

From Letters of a Radio-Engineer to His Son by Mills, John

“Why, you thick heads,” replied Jimmy, with more force than politeness, “don’t you know that you don’t have to have a lightning arrester with a loop aerial?”

From The Radio Boys at the Sending Station Making Good in the Wireless Room by Chapman, Allen