the coast is clear

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the coast is clear

1. (idiomatic) There is no danger; one can freely pass through a region without risk of discovery.

   Wait there, watch the back of the building, and whistle when the coast is clear.

   • 1921, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Tarzan the Terrible, Grosset & Dunlap, page 222:

     Seeing that the coast was clear, Tarzan stepped into the darkened entrance […]

   • 1945, Christopher Isherwood, Prater Violet, New York: Random House, published [1956], →LCCN, page 94:

     Sometimes Dorothy herself left me. She had plenty of friends in the studio, and would slip away for a chat when the coast seemed clear.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:the coast is clear.