seal off

Idioms  

1. Also, seal up. Close tightly or barricade to prevent entry or exit. For example, We're sealing off the unused wing of the building, or The jar is tightly sealed up. Dating from the first half of the 1900s, this idiom uses seal in the sense of “close securely,” as one used to do with a seal of wax.

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

seal off

Despite that, deputies that day failed to seal off the Guthrie property with police crime-scene tape, a standard protocol.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 2, 2026

The luxurious hotel complex -- hard to access and therefore easy to seal off -- was proposed by Washington and Tehran as well as their Pakistani and Qatari mediators, Switzerland said Tuesday.

From Barron's ● Jun. 16, 2026

Working with Ukrainian authorities, the team from Gloucestershire aims to teach farmers how to seal off areas that are highly contaminated.

From BBC ● Mar. 13, 2026

Schmidt said a proposed alternative had been to allow Deltopia to continue but to seal off Isla Vista to prevent out of towners from entering by using roadblocks and checkpoints.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 18, 2026

We’ll seal off everything except the upper storage room and the tunnels leading in the front and out the back.

From "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH" by Robert C. O'Brien

Related Words

• circle
• enclose
• surround