# Why didn't my brother electrocute himself? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 23, 2004, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-my-brother-electrocute-himself/261097 "2004-08-23T15:44:40Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Bill\_Door](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@Bill\_Door](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bill_Door)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2015, 12:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-my-brother-electrocute-himself/261097/41 "2015-06-30T12:44:40Z")
While people are doing experiments, the way a GFCI works is by comparing the current in the hot leg to that in the neutral leg. The if the difference between the two exceeds the trip current, around 5 milliamps, it trips. What this means is that if an ungrounded person’s body is placed between the hot and neutral legs the GFCI will **NOT** trip because the hot and neutral legs are balanced. Trust me on this. Back in the 70’s when they were new I tested one and found out the hard way. Yes, there were beverages involved. ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2015, 10:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-my-brother-electrocute-himself/261097/42 "2015-06-30T22:00:52Z")
> [@engineer\_comp\_geek](#): > > Ok, here are the results. > > I came into the laundry room with a bucket, an old extension cord with the end cut off that I happened to have lying around, and a set of diagonal cutters, which prompted my eldest son to immediately exclaim “oh god, you’re not doing another science experiment, are you?” I think I’m getting a reputation around my house. Anyway, I stripped back about 2 inches of insulation off of the wire, so I had roughly 2 inches of bare stranded wire placed into the bucket. I started with the wires about an inch apart. > > As expected, the breaker did not blow. > > I moved the wires as close together as I could with this crude setup (maybe an eighth of an inch apart at the most) and repeated the experiment, and again it did not blow the breaker. > > About what I expected, although I was kinda hoping to be able to get the wires close enough to trip the breaker. > > Water does conduct electricity a lot better than something like wood, but it’s nowhere near as good of a conductor as something like copper. I wonder what would have happened if you’d dumped some salt into the water before trying this? (would you still be around to tell the tale?). We’ve never been in the situation with the OP, though we did get a bit concerned when our carpets got drenched due to a storm / poorly designed basement drain last year. We _do_ have several GFCI outlets that seem to trip at random - and they control a number of seemingly unrelated outlets like the one in the main level bathroom also covers the basement bathroom and an outlet in the furnace room. Maybe that one trips because of the freezer that uses the outlet. Another one in the kitchen trips periodically for no apparent reason whatsoever - I’m not sure anything is even plugged into that same circuit. Bizarre. Of course, sometimes I think the wiring in this house was done by a drunken chimpanzee. We have one phone outlet that has had to be replaced, twice, because the wires seem to corrode or short out. First symptom is that the phone sounds very crackly. When we had an electrician out a few months ago, he looked and said it looked almost like the outlet had been exposed to some kind of liquid (it had not). ---
**Author:** ![GusNSpot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gusnspot/32/436_2.png) [@GusNSpot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GusNSpot)\ **Post date:** [July 1, 2015, 5:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-my-brother-electrocute-himself/261097/43 "2015-07-01T05:59:06Z")
Used to have stand in a foot of water to flip the switch on an old Square D fuse box hanging by the wires to change the fuses when the sump pump blew it. I was always figuring I was going to get it because I was shaking in fear so badly. Eventually got things sorted but about 6 times in one year I almost shit my pants. Electricity hurts me more than most. Too much exposure IMO… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-didnt-my-brother-electrocute-himself/261097.md?page=2)