safety device

A device that detects faulty parts with sensors and shuts down the system in order to protect people and property from electric shock or fire in case of accidents such as short circuits, earth leakage, or insulation breakdown in electrical and electronic equipment. A common example is an earth leakage circuit breaker that detects earth leakage and cuts off the circuit. In electrical installations, in order to prevent cascading faults, multiple safety devices are combined and their detection and operation times are adjusted to create a system that only shuts down the minimum necessary faulty part — this is called protection coordination.