Power Outage

Posted by Barney August 17, 2003In reply to Power Outage posted by ESC on August 17, 2003

'Outage, in the sense of 'Power Outage' is unknown in Britain - 'Power failure' is the current term. How many other countries use 'outage', I wonder?
However, I'm glad that the electricity is getting back to normal.

U.S. -- we use outage and failure. Or, more likely, "The power is off." Or, "The electricity is off."

UK also uses power cuts

OUTAGE - "a period of interrupted service, as of electric power or gas. 1903, formed from 'out,' adv. + 'age,' on the model of shortage." The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology by Robert K. Barnhart (HarperCollins Publishers, New York, 1995).

In the UK we also use power outage.