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View synonyms for fail-safe

fail-safe

[ feyl-seyf ]

adjective

  1. Electronics. pertaining to or noting a mechanism built into a system, as in an early warning system or a nuclear reactor, for insuring safety should the system fail to operate properly.
  2. equipped with a secondary system that insures continued operation even if the primary system fails.
  3. (sometimes initial capital letter) of, relating to, or designating a system of coded military controls in which bombers dispatched to a prearranged point as part of a standard operating procedure cannot advance farther without direct orders from a designated authority and cannot have the nuclear warheads they carry armed until they have passed their prearranged point.
  4. guaranteed to work; totally reliable:

    a fail-safe recipe for a cheese soufflé.



noun

  1. (sometimes initial capital letter) the point beyond which the bombers cannot go without specific instruction; the fail-safe point.
  2. something designed to work or function automatically to prevent breakdown of a mechanism, system, or the like.

verb (used with object)

fail-safed, fail-safing.
  1. to make fail-safe.

fail-safe

adjective

  1. designed to return to a safe condition in the event of a failure or malfunction
  2. (of a nuclear weapon) capable of being deactivated in the event of a failure or accident
  3. unlikely to fail; foolproof
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

verb

  1. intr to return to a safe condition in the event of a failure or malfunction
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012
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Word History and Origins

Origin of fail-safe1

First recorded in 1945–50; apparently from verb phrase to fail safe(ly)
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Example Sentences

One significant solution implemented as a fail-safe for Level 4 automated vehicles is the concept of remote driving.

And because airplanes are packed with fail-safes, there are times when a flight with a malfunctioning system can safely proceed simply by relying on one or more backups instead.

This is a fail-safe scenario but the converse "wrong side" failures -- when the signal goes from red to green -- are much more hazardous.

However, discussions of fall-backs and fail-safes have not been welcome in the Wales camp while the possibility of automatic qualification remains.

From BBC

"These memory immune cells with latent suppressive properties act as a fail-safe mechanism in addition to the protection from traditional memory suppressive T cells."

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