What does escape mean

Crossword clues for escape

escape

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English

escape

I.verb

COLLOCATIONS FROM OTHER ENTRIES

a cry escapes sb/sb’s lips

▪ A cry escaped her lips as he tightened his grip on her wrist.

an escape route (=a way of leaving a building or place in an emergency such as a fire)

▪ Check that your escape route is clear.

an escaped prisoner

▪ Soldiers arrived, looking for escaped prisoners.

escape death (=avoid being killed)

▪ He fell while climbing in the mountains, and only narrowly escaped death.

escape from (a) prison

▪ Blake escaped from a Missouri prison last year.

escape from jail

▪ The killer has escaped from jail.

escape from reality

▪ The programmes help viewers escape from reality.

escape hatch (=a hole in an aircraft etc through which you can escape)

escape justice

▪ Acts of terrorism must not escape justice.

escape sb’s notice (=not be noticed by someone)

▪ It had not escaped his notice that Phil seemed interested in Jean.

escape the consequences (=avoid them)

▪ I knew I’d made a mistake and that I couldn’t escape the consequences.

escape unharmed

▪ The girl managed to escape unharmed.

escape velocity

escape/avoid detection

▪ By flying low, the plane avoided detection by enemy radar.

escape/avoid injury

▪ Two workmen narrowly escaped injury when a wall collapsed.

escape/avoid liability

▪ The defendant escaped liability by proving that he had taken all possible measures to avoid the accident.

escape/avoid prosecution

▪ He was lucky to escape prosecution.

escape/avoid punishment

▪ The thieves managed to escape punishment.

escaped unhurt

▪ The driver escaped unhurt from the accident.

escape/emerge unscathed

▪ He escaped unscathed from the accident.

▪ The government was relatively unscathed by the scandal.

fire escape

flee/escape across the border

▪ Over 100,000 civilians fled across the border.

flee/escape into exile

▪ Hundreds of people fled into exile or were jailed.

had a narrow escape

▪ A woman had a narrow escape yesterday when her car left the road.

COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS

■ ADVERB

narrowly

▪ For a moment Trent and Mariana were held immobile, stunned by the incredible power from which they had so narrowly escaped.

▪ During the war he narrowly escaped death dozens of times.

▪ In 1949 he narrowly escaped the first of three attempts on his life.

▪ Looking to her heart, she sees the chasm left by a death she narrowly escaped.

▪ Harassed by the nomad Scythians, whom he could not catch, he narrowly escaped the fate of Cyrus.

▪ Knowingly or not, others have narrowly escaped Pottker.

▪ He addressed a crowd of his civilian supporters at Baabda on Oct. 12, when he only narrowly escaped an assassination attempt.

▪ In both cases, the journalists narrowly escaped injury but the houses from which they had been transmitting were devastated.

■ NOUN

attempt

▪ A last desperate attempt to escape into the murky waters.

▪ Despite his bulk, he jumped several fences in a last-ditch attempt to escape.

▪ None of the men made any attempt to escape when they struggled, subdued and shaken, on to the bank.

▪ Victor had apparently made no attempt to escape.

▪ The theory of the global system based on transnational practices is an attempt to escape from the limitations of state-centrism.

▪ Mould talked about some of his previous attempts to escape.

▪ I pull my battledress jacket over my head in a forlorn attempt to escape from the tiny tormentors; sleep is impossible.

▪ These are the remains of unfortunate wretches driven to kill themselves in a futile attempt to escape the torments of the Castle.

attention

▪ Phillips was first to go after an off-the-ball incident that escaped the attention of most people in the ground.

▪ Of these, the best known is the Everglade kite, which escaped attention even longer than the crocodile.

▪ A single vote, wasted votes and used votes Nothing escapes attention so easily as the obvious.

▪ But the counterproductive nature of this policy gesture can not escape attention.

▪ Developments in primary care Primary care did not escape the attention of the Thatcher government either.

▪ By waiting until the last minute, donors can sometimes escape attention in the hectic time before an election.

▪ The Government's actions regarding observance of the law do not escape attention by ordinary people.

▪ Life has slowed down so drastically for him that Blue is now able to see things that have previously escaped his attention.

chance

▪ His hopes of a chance to escape soared.

▪ If he had some sinister purpose, then why would he offer me a chance to escape?

▪ Reason and conscience both told me that if I were ever to have any chance of escaping successfully this was that chance.

▪ I just couldn't keep away from her when I got the chance to escape from Rocamar the other day.

▪ The chance to escape from the daily drudgery in the pits must have been more than attractive.

▪ Now might be her best chance to escape while Peter was still away.

▪ Sikes and Nancy gave him no chance to escape and Oliver had no breath to call out for help.

▪ Anyway, more importantly, this was my last chance to escape.

injury

▪ Both occupants escaped serious injury but aircraft is a write-off.

▪ Both riders walked away and escaped serious injury.

▪ Taylor was left badly bruised down his right side-from leg to shoulder-but escaped without permanent injuries.

▪ Some workers, their faces blackened by the acrid smoke, fled in panic, escaping injury.

▪ Goreng had escaped injury entirely, being just outside the radius of harm.

▪ Despite the violence, the prisoner escaped injury and was sent to the state penitentiary.

▪ It shattered the window but the glass held and he escaped injury.

▪ In both cases, the journalists narrowly escaped injury but the houses from which they had been transmitting were devastated.

life

▪ Lucky you were to escape with your lives, let alone your horse.

▪ I imagined that these characters were popular because they reflected the frustration of those who couldn't escape their lives either.

▪ It was impossible to escape an impression of lives deeply disturbed and unhappy.

▪ The injured woman was lucky to escape with her life.

▪ The Great Idea had become a major disaster, she had been lucky to escape with her life.

▪ I've been escaping all my life.

notice

▪ The fact that closing date for entries was 28 January seems to have escaped its notice.

▪ This discourtesy did not escape the notice of the press.

▪ If this has escaped your notice then read on!

▪ It may have escaped your notice, but the biggest of seasonal shifts happened last night.

▪ Anything positioned beneath the tilt of her chin seemed to escape her notice.

▪ The farm was so cut off from the world, even big stories like that one escaped our notice.

▪ It hasn't escaped my notice that you've gone from five-star hotels to virtual slums.

▪ Has it escaped their notice that last Thursday was the first really warm and sunny day of the year?

prison

▪ John's face seemed to come alive and his spirit escaped the prison of the photograph releasing brief images of happy times.

▪ By learning and practicing the basics, Dan had escaped the prison of his handicap for ever.

▪ Colin Wood escaped from prison in 1994 and spent three years on the run before he was tracked down in Alabama.

▪ Calderon had escaped from state prison.

▪ He escaped a prison sentence after magistrates heard he was seeking help for his drink problem.

▪ Light leaped out through the door, escaped from prison at 186, 000 miles per second.

▪ Each of them had attempted to escape from another prison at least once.

prisoner

▪ A prisoner had escaped from Auschwitz and ten prisoners were required to die in the starvation bunker - block 13.

▪ He was the only prisoner ever to successfully escape.

▪ The prisoners who escaped invariably turned up at their homes, where they were given accommodation, food and clothing.

▪ Despite the violence, the prisoner escaped injury and was sent to the state penitentiary.

▪ It did not belong to the prisoners who had escaped that day.

way

▪ He found the panel that would open the way to escape.

▪ Now Jack sees a way to escape from it all by faking his death in a house fire.

▪ The only way to escape this tyranny is to abandon the house.

▪ He later claimed that he simply refused to mount it and in that way escaped death.

▪ There was no way to escape.

▪ People have found ways to escape ill-fitting jobs, start training programs, or enter graduate school.

▪ There is no altogether painless way of escaping from a pay-as-you-go scheme, particularly if you want people to make substitute provision.

■ VERB

allow

▪ This meant that substantial building-up would be needed, to allow the water to escape.

▪ He was seeking a skill to allow him to escape an impoverished background.

▪ If there is heavy rain, the spillways must be enlarged to allow the floodwater to escape before the dam bursts.

▪ Or, perhaps, nothing allowed him to escape.

▪ As well as dilating, the capillaries become more permeable and allow fluid to escape into the tissues, which produces swelling.

▪ He's allowed her to escape.

▪ Avoid moisture based products which swell the hair and allow the pigment to escape.

▪ Such leaks were important because they could allow radiation to escape.

help

▪ Instead she takes part in his piracy and gains meaning for life, before she helps him escape.

▪ April fled in the night to her sweetheart, Roland, begging him to help her escape the now enraged witch.

▪ Luckily Joseph was able to grease a few palms, thus helping his brother to escape.

▪ A promising young lawyer assigned to defend a murder suspect finds her client so appealing, she helps him escape.

▪ I wanted people, a friend, somebody to talk to ... somebody who could help me escape from my island.

▪ She was pleased to see that the 460 uses unleaded fuel, helping her bid to escape the city smoke.

▪ Oxfam is trying to help these families escape from their hand to mouth existence.

manage

▪ The girl managed to run off but the man repeated the attack and again she managed to escape.

▪ Prison officials are investigating how he managed to escape from the maximum-security facility.

▪ Crazy Horse and most of his band managed to escape.

▪ Ivor Stokle and Pauline Leyshon managed to escape from the car, but suffered horrific burns.

▪ An investigation into how he managed to escape so easily is now under way.

▪ He refused and although the base was destroyed, Al-Makesh and Bernard managed to escape.

▪ I manage to escape without answering.

seek

▪ Nevertheless, it has become established as the only real alternative for organisations seeking to avoid or escape proprietary, single-vendor systems.

▪ Instead, fear of death pursued him as he sought to escape the threats from Jezebel.

▪ For forty years villagers have streamed into its fetid blocks, seeking to escape rural poverty.

▪ However the individual parts are mutually repellent and while attached to the dirt also seek to escape their neighbours.

try

▪ However, the fun-lover is motivated by a fear of pain, which he or she tries to escape.

▪ The child is trying to escape and avoid the very exercises you are doing to reverse the underlying difficulty!

▪ In my sixth year I did make myself a smaller canoe, but I did not try to escape in it.

▪ White told how he had repeatedly tried to escape, been twice captured, twice imprisoned, finally condemned to death.

▪ He pushed his chair back from the table as if trying to escape.

▪ Or gas before he backed himself into a corner and tried to escape by means of the faro table.

▪ I tried to escape, so did my uncle.

▪ Then they set the church on fire and gunned down those who tried to escape.

want

▪ This, though, does arouse pity for Blanche as she does want to escape, by marrying Mitch.

▪ In short, they want to escape into and actually experience the period.

▪ She wants to escape from home, and the least we can do is to let her stay here for a while.

▪ Depression wakes us up early and interferes with sleep, but sadness makes us want to escape into sleep.

▪ If you want to escape you will know where to run to.

▪ Students prone to violence are what everyone, rich and poor, wants to escape.

▪ She just wanted to escape back to her cottage, her solitary existence.

▪ People will become desperate and they will want to escape.

PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES

escape your attention

▪ He said that very little escapes his attention.

▪ Life has slowed down so drastically for him that Blue is now able to see things that have previously escaped his attention.

▪ Nor should the similarities in the broader dimensions of the problem of youth employment escape our attention.

▪ Richie had the feeling that something had escaped his attention.

▪ There he might hope to hide in the depths, to escape our attentions.

▪ Virtually no country escaped its attentions.

make good your escape

▪ Angel One and his followers had made good their escape.

▪ At all events the pursuit came to a sudden halt and Henry was able to make good his escape in peace.

▪ By the time they had sorted out the confusion and given chase, the woman had made good her escape.

▪ He opened the door and prepared to make good his escape.

▪ Instead, she made good her escape, bolting the galley door so that he could not follow her.

▪ Only the timely arrival of a window-cleaner enabled Branson to make good his escape.

▪ Salim makes good his escape on the steamer - bound, we take it, for his bride.

▪ The next morning it was found that General Sedgwick had made good his escape and removed his bridges....

narrow escape

▪ But he has also seen the loss of life and the narrow escapes.

▪ He is a veteran of numerous firefights and narrow escapes who has shown notable serenity throughout the siege.

▪ He was probably even now thanking his lucky stars for a narrow escape.

▪ His narrow escape at Petit-Clamart finally convinced the General that it was time to take action to meet both dangers at once.

▪ It had been a narrow escape and I was impressed.

▪ The driver launches forward for a narrow escape.

▪ The hours of liberty are long, full of wonder and narrow escapes, precautions, hidden devices and daring.

▪ They have no time for self-congratulation on their narrow escape.

EXAMPLES FROM OTHER ENTRIES

▪ A cloud of poisonous gas escaped from the chemical plant.

▪ Although I know that the novel was published in the nineteenth century, the actual date escapes me.

▪ Criminals generally know their neighborhood well, so it's not difficult for them to escape into the back streets.

▪ Four prisoners escaped through a hole in the fence.

▪ Grant had escaped through a bathroom window while in police custody.

▪ Guards have been ordered to shoot anyone trying to escape.

▪ Hare escaped death by testifying against his partner, who was later hanged.

▪ He escaped from prison in June, but was rearrested by police a month later.

▪ He ducked down an alley to escape from the mob that was chasing him.

▪ He was one of nine men who escaped from prison in July.

▪ I could see no way of escaping the boredom of the small-town social scene.

▪ I know I've heard this song before but its name escapes me.

▪ It looks as if they've escaped. They're probably over the border by now.

▪ Josie managed to escape from her attacker and call the police.

▪ Many young offenders escape punishment completely.

▪ Only four people managed to escape before the roof collapsed.

▪ People are willing to pay $10 for a movie ticket to escape their problems.

▪ Police surrounded the building, but somehow the gunman managed to escape.

▪ So far the terrorists have managed to escape the police.

▪ Some people were able to escape over the border into Tanzania.

EXAMPLES FROM CORPUS

▪ And suddenly she couldn't escape quickly enough.

▪ But it means retailers' profit margins escape the tax net.

▪ Gerhard Berger escaped unhurt from a high-speed collision with Ferrari team-mate Jean Alesi.

▪ He has escaped lightly from other brushes with the law, and from politically incorrect condemnations of homosexuality, feminism and contraception.

▪ Knowingly or not, others have narrowly escaped Pottker.

▪ Lots of computer-generated technical dazzle in this fantasy about jungle animals escaping a supernatural board game and terrorizing a New Hampshire town.

▪ There was no possible way to escape.

▪ Weldon Flaharty, said in a recent interview that he inexplicably escaped administrative punishment, which could have shortened his career.

II.noun

COLLOCATIONS FROM CORPUS

■ ADJECTIVE

great

▪ The journey represents the great escape from destruction; it is begun in time and ended beyond it.

▪ Such a fellow is Colin Fletcher, long-distance trekker, amateur naturalist and past master of great escapes.

▪ Boro manager Lennie Lawrence has a reputation for engineering great escapes and on this form he may achieve yet another.

▪ Meanwhile Hereford's great escape from the relegation zone is going to plan - four games now without defeat.

▪ Clutching the sheet, letting a great hollow groan escape me, I staggered back across the room.

▪ With air-driven models, especially those that reach the tank bottom, the contact time is greater and little escapes.

▪ Given the evidence against them, it must rank as one of the great escapes.

lucky

▪ Rangers, having just survived a lucky escape, launched their first attack.

▪ They agreed they were quite lucky to escape the fire and set off for a foreign country.

▪ My passenger had had a lucky escape that night; he had used his wits well and survived another fight.

▪ She could never get over her lucky escapes.

▪ One girl had a lucky escape when a fence post narrowly missed her head.

▪ They had a really lucky escape.

▪ He should not allow himself to wallow in it, however: hindsight may well suggest he has had a lucky escape.

▪ A neighbour had a lucky escape, for she had left the couple's house just minutes before.

miraculous

▪ Nottingham also dreamt of achieving a miraculous escape from relegation.

▪ My family had been lucky, we had had a charmed life, we had made miraculous escapes.

▪ They might have had a miraculous escape.

▪ In this extremity he sought no miraculous escape, no sudden revelation of a known lake.

▪ The police have described it as a miraculous escape.

▪ It was here that the aircraft was involved with a miraculous escape after an in-flight fire raged through the aircraft.

narrow

▪ They have no time for self-congratulation on their narrow escape.

▪ He is a veteran of numerous firefights and narrow escapes who has shown notable serenity throughout the siege.

▪ His narrow escape at Petit-Clamart finally convinced the General that it was time to take action to meet both dangers at once.

▪ But he has also seen the loss of life and the narrow escapes.

▪ He was probably even now thanking his lucky stars for a narrow escape.

▪ The driver launches forward for a narrow escape.

▪ The hours of liberty are long, full of wonder and narrow escapes, precautions, hidden devices and daring.

▪ It had been a narrow escape and I was impressed.

possible

▪ For many people the only possible escape from their permanent state of poverty and malnourishment is to emigrate.

▪ And in the instant of time available to him, he thought of the only place of possible escape from this nightmare.

▪ So it is possible that avian death-feigning is tuned in to this one crucial moment of possible escape.

▪ Together with the Vatican, United States operatives made possible the escape from justice of some of the worst mass-killers.

■ NOUN

attempt

▪ He's made 2 escape attempts and had a reputation for persistent violence.

▪ The home as an escape attempt Saunders, however, challenges this argument.

▪ Oxford United continue their escape attempt.

▪ Moral careers, escape attempts and front and back regions.

clause

▪ He would act alone, but he would take care to provide himself with an escape clause.

▪ Fourth, the escape clauses it provides are likely to be far from fully effective.

▪ Here was the escape clause the board was looking for.

▪ The film strives for a surface kind of cynicism, only to invoke the Love Conquers All escape clause in the end.

▪ The metal employers' federation says half its members may resort to the escape clause.

hatch

▪ Taking hold of a strong branch, he finally cleared the escape hatch with his legs and dropped to the ground.

▪ Unlike the cecropia and promethea moths, however, these two do not have built-in escape hatches for the emerging adults.

▪ Some experts suggested that the escape hatch might have been damaged.

▪ There was also an escape hatch in the inner hard cocoon.

▪ Although normally kept shut, there is an escape hatch for the after cabin in each of the cockpit seats.

▪ The two sides were now on a collision course: Khrushchev could not allow West Berlin to remain as an escape hatch.

▪ Another escape hatch that Olson slams shut upon us is the device of distinguishing between Pound-the-man and Pound-the-poet.

▪ Even more important, birth control has a crucial escape hatch.

plan

▪ Reports of escape plans were denigrated by MI5.

▪ They leave, the two cars follow the same escape plan they used at Danvers.

▪ We kept in close contact and re-tested our escape plans.

prison

▪ That is presumably the product of what we now know about the Brixton prison escape.

route

▪ Mr Letts tried to block their escape route and was mown down.

▪ The governor posted his troops all along the escape routes.

▪ The last side street which could have provided any escape route for the marchers was by now several hundred yards behind them.

▪ After fleeing Illinois for Utah, the Mormons had always been obsessed with finding escape routes to the sea.

▪ But unless escape routes have been allowed, that response will be thwarted.

▪ I glanced back over my shoulder, at the same time looking for an escape route.

▪ Appreciation that he had provided her with the escape route she had so badly sought?

▪ We had planned our escape routes beforehand.

velocity

▪ As the star shrank, the gravitational field at the surface would become stronger and the escape velocity would increase.

▪ Some of the gases from the explosion and fireball may reach escape velocity.

▪ This critical speed is called the escape velocity.

▪ A significant fraction of their water content can emerge from the explosion at a speed below the escape velocity of Mercury.

▪ As the radius of the star is reduced the escape velocity increases until eventually it reaches the velocity of light.

▪ In fact, it is traveling well above escape velocity.

▪ Jupiter is a very massive planet, and its escape velocity is correspondingly high.

▪ Even modest-sized impactors can blast atmospheric gases off of Mars at speeds above escape velocity.

■ VERB

block

▪ He realized his mistake too late and when he turned back to the entrance Sabrina was already there, blocking his escape.

▪ Harsh fortresses of prickly pears and shard grass and dead branches block off all escape.

▪ Mr Letts tried to block their escape route and was mown down.

▪ They are now both in front of her on the road, blocking any escape.

▪ Swarms of wolf riders are often deployed ahead of the army's line of march to scout and block any route of escape.

▪ Behind them a huge force of Orcs moved to block their escape.

make

▪ Humanity is already making plans for its escape.

▪ But Solomon sat tight in his rain barrel, and after the cossacks had left empty-handed, he made his escape.

▪ I did make my escape from Roundhay - by a route taken by many of my contemporaries: higher education.

▪ As they made their escape one produced a handgun and warned the student not to follow them.

▪ I decided to make my escape as soon as I could.

▪ Salim makes good his escape on the steamer - bound, we take it, for his bride.

offer

▪ The process approach offers a convenient escape from difficult value questions.

▪ The words seemed to offer hope of escape from the agony on which he was skewered.

▪ Elsie offered him an escape and, more importantly, it was a legitimate escape.

▪ It offers an escape from the double bind of commentary pithily summarised by Foucault, in the passage I quoted just now.

prevent

▪ Once formed, the joints were internally sealed with pitch to prevent the escape of any obnoxious gases or liquids.

▪ Horror stories include kids chained to looms to prevent escape.

▪ Hold them tightly all the way home to prevent escape.

▪ This prevents any escape across the open ground and many of the rabbits will become entangled in the net.

▪ Each prisoner had a nylon noose around his neck to prevent escape.

▪ Greenhouse gases trap heat and prevent its escape from the atmosphere into space.

▪ It was decided to stop the car around junction 16 to minimise the danger to the public and prevent any escapes.

▪ Nevertheless, he added, it had failed to take the necessary steps to prevent an escape of rainbow trout.

seek

▪ Even when she was too tired to read she sought escape in romance-cubes she spent all her wages on at the Madreidetic shop.

▪ The small fish broke into smaller shoals, desperately seeking escape.

▪ Another week and the boats and banks of the Wannsee would be crowded with Berliners seeking a few hours of escape.

▪ In this extremity he sought no miraculous escape, no sudden revelation of a known lake.

▪ She threw Carla from her and looked around her wild-eyed, like an animal seeking an escape route.

PHRASES FROM OTHER ENTRIES

block sb's way/path/exit/escape etc