grounded

1. 1
   adjectivenot before a noun

   Confined to stay at home as a punishment, usually imposed by a parent.

   She was grounded for two weeks for breaking curfew.

   Grounded again, he watched from the window as his friends left without him.

   Note

   Household discipline, and it stays after the verb: you are grounded, get grounded, are grounded for a week. Placed before a noun, as in a grounded teenager, it drifts toward the steady, sensible meaning, so the punishment reading wants be or get. Jeph Jacques's webcomic Questionable Content (2022) shows the typical reprieve: "You're not actually grounded."

2. 2
   adjective

   Emotionally stable and sensible, with well-considered priorities and a clear sense of what truly matters.

   Like a ship with a heavy keel that stays steady no matter how rough the water gets.

   Despite her sudden success, she remained remarkably grounded.

   Years of hardship left him grounded and clear about his real priorities.

   Similardown-to-earth, level-headed, balanced, sensible, stable

   Oppositeflighty, fake, pretentious

   Note

   Its opposites map out the praise. Someone grounded is not flighty or spacy, not out of touch, and not fake, pretentious or a poseur. So the word joins steadiness to authenticity, a pairing that sensible and prudent do not quite carry. Realistic and mature come closer, but grounded adds the sense of someone who is genuinely themselves.

3. 3
   adjective

   Prohibited from flying, as an aircraft kept on the ground by weather, mechanical faults, or regulation.

   Dense fog left dozens of planes grounded at the airport.

   The airline kept its entire fleet grounded pending safety inspections.

   Oppositeairborne

   Note

   Aviation applies it to people as well as machines. A pilot can be grounded just as a plane can, whether by bad weather, a mechanical defect, a regulatory order or an expired certification. It keeps the feel of a past participle, so it sits naturally after keep, leave and remain. Whole fleets are grounded as readily as single aircraft.

4. 4
   adjectiveCanadaUS

   Connected to the earth by a conductor, so that excess or stray electric charge is safely carried away.

   The technician confirmed that every metal casing was properly grounded.

   A grounded circuit reduces the risk of dangerous voltage buildup.

   Similarearthed

   Note

   The electrician's word in Canada and the US. Where North Americans say grounded, other English speakers say earthed, and the two are interchangeable in meaning. Technically, a grounded conductor is tied to earth or to a common zero-potential reference. That gives fault current a return path and holds the system voltage steady, which is why casings, outlets and circuits are all described this way.

5. 5
   adjective

   Run onto the seabed or a shoal, so that a vessel rests on the bottom and cannot move freely.

   The tanker remained grounded on the reef for three days.

   With the tide gone, several small craft lay grounded along the estuary.

   Similaraground, stranded, beached

   Oppositeafloat

   Note

   A ship's word for a vessel that has come to rest on the bottom. Drachinifel's Last Ride of the High Seas Fleet (2018) has the battlecruiser Lion "grounded in the shadows of Terschelling". Aground means the same but usually follows run or lie, while grounded works as an ordinary adjective after is. Such a ship stays fast until a rising tide, a lightened cargo or a tow frees her.

6. 6
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of ground.

   Engineers grounded the circuit to protect the equipment.

   The captain had grounded the vessel to avoid a worse collision.

   Note

   The regular past of ground, and it carries every sense of that verb, including some no adjective shares. A student can be grounded in the first principles of a subject. A cricketer has grounded the bat to avoid being run out. In Philippine English, a person can be grounded in the sense of electrocuted. The electrical sense, like the earthed conductor, is a US use.

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