Does the usage “ lose power to the escalator” make sense? “We are losing power to the lights, the escalators and the snack machines! You need to fix the electricity!“ Does it sound natural? I don’t

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Does the usage “ lose power to the escalator” make sense? “We are losing power to the lights, the escalators and the snack machines! You need to fix the electricity!“ Does it sound natural? I don’t think I would use the preposition ‘to’ here. But I read it in a book, maybe it’s just I’m not familiar with the usage. I hope someone can help me with this sentence.

May 28, 2023 9:32 AM

Answers · 8

Power travels through electric wires TO the escalators, just as you travel TO school in a bus.

May 28, 2023

The continuous is an odd verb tense here. You have power. You lose it. Then you don’t have it. The ‘losing’ isn’t usually thought of something ongoing. We lost power to.. We’ve lost power to … We’re going to lose power to .. We’ll lose power to … You could say though We’re losing power to our systems. (Some we’ve lost already. Others we’ll lose soon)

May 31, 2023

This sounds natural to me. I'm not sure what other preposition could possibly work in this situation. The electrical current flows TO things, so it makes sense for it to be "power to the escalator." I hope that helps!

May 28, 2023

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