equipped

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of equip.

   The expedition equipped its members with cold-weather gear.

   Each rescue vehicle was equipped with a first-aid kit.

   Note

   The final p doubles before -ed, and the one form covers both the simple past (they equipped the team) and the participle after had or was. Usually the person is the object and the gear follows with: equipped the crew with rigging. Another use reverses this and puts the item itself in object position, as in she equipped the shield, meaning she brought it into use.

2. 2
   adjective

   Having the equipment, resources, and skills needed for a task, and so well prepared to meet it.

   The hospital is poorly equipped to deal with a sudden surge of patients.

   Volunteers who are properly equipped can clear a flooded road in a single afternoon.

   Similarprepared, ready, qualified

   Oppositeunprepared, unequipped

   Note

   Here a participle has settled into an adjective, and the clearest sign is that it takes degree: more equipped, most equipped, very equipped. It points forward in two ways, equipped to do something (most equipped to deliver services) or equipped for a place or task (not very equipped for the cellars). That gradability is what separates it from the past participle, which records an act of supplying.

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