fatigue fracture
- noun
- /fəˈtiːɡ ˈfræktʃər/
- Specialized
:
fractura por fatiga
- After studying the construction, the engineers found a fatigue fracture in the beam caused by years of heavy use.
Examples
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A fatigue fracture can occur in athletes due to the constant strain on their bones during training.
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Regular inspections help detect a fatigue fracture before it leads to catastrophic failure.
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The engineer discovered a fatigue fracture in the bridge support beam after years of heavy traffic.
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The runner suffered a fatigue fracture in her foot due to continuous long-distance training.
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The athlete suffered a fatigue fracture in her foot.
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Many runners experience fatigue fractures due to overtraining.
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The doctor explained that my foot pain was caused by a fatigue fracture from running too much on hard surfaces.
Synonyms
5
4.6
A small crack in a bone caused by doing the same movement again and again
A break in metal or hard material caused by repeated stress
How Damaged
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning is directly compositional: 'fatigue' (weakening from repeated stress) combined with 'fracture' (a break) yields a break caused by repeated stress. This noun–noun technical compound follows regular formation patterns and is cross-linguistically comparable, so a B1 learner who knows both constituents should be able to infer the meaning.
Etymology
Fatigue fracture comes from two simple words: fatigue (like 'tiredness') and fracture ('a break'). Picture metal or a bone that becomes slowly 'tired' after the same heavy use again and again and then cracks. That's why the term means a crack caused by repeated stress rather than by one sudden injury.