to slip or get away, as from confinement or restraint; gain or regain liberty: to escape from jail.
2.
to slip away from pursuit or peril; avoid capture, punishment, or any threatened evil.
3.
to issue from a confining enclosure, as a fluid.
4.
to slip away; fade: The words escaped from memory.
5.
Botany. (of an originally cultivated plant) to grow wild.
6.
(of a rocket, molecule, etc.) to achieve escape velocity.
–verb (used with object)
7.
to slip away from or elude (pursuers, captors, etc.): He escaped the police.
8.
to succeed in avoiding (any threatened or possible danger or evil): She escaped capture.
9.
to elude (one's memory, notice, search, etc.).
10.
to fail to be noticed or recollected by (a person): Her reply escapes me.
11.
(of a sound or utterance) to slip from or be expressed by (a person, one's lips, etc.) inadvertently.
–noun
12.
an act or instance of escaping.
13.
the fact of having escaped.
14.
a means of escaping: We used the tunnel as an escape.
15.
avoidance of reality: She reads mystery stories as an escape.
16.
leakage, as of water or gas, from a pipe or storage container.
17.
Botany. a plant that originated in cultivated stock and is now growing wild.
18.
Physics,Rocketry. the act of achieving escape velocity.
19.
Computers. a key (frequently labeled ESC) found on microcomputer keyboards and used for any of various functions, as to interrupt a command or move from one part of a program to another.
–adjective
20.
for or providing an escape: an escape route.
[Origin: 1250–1300; ME escapen,ascapen < ONF escaper (F échapper) < VL *excappāre, v. deriv. (with ex-ex-1) of LL cappa hooded cloak (see cap1)]
—Related forms
es·cap·a·ble, adjective
es·cape·less, adjective
es·cap·er, noun
es·cap·ing·ly, adverb
—Synonyms 1. flee, abscond, decamp. 7. dodge, flee, avoid. Escape,elude,evade mean to keep free of something. To escape is to succeed in keeping away from danger, pursuit, observation, etc.: to escape punishment. To elude implies baffling pursuers or slipping through an apparently tight net: The fox eluded the hounds. To evade is to turn aside from or go out of reach of a person or thing: to evade the police. See also avoid. 12. flight.
escape velocity, the velocity a body must be given in order to escape the gravitational hold of some other larger body, e.g., the earth, moon, or sun. A body given less than the escape velocity will fall back toward the surface of the larger body; a body given a velocity equal to or greater than the escape velocity will still be attracted by the larger body, but this force will not be sufficient to cause it to return. Escape velocity depends on the mass of the larger body and the distance of the smaller body from its center, being proportional to the square root of the ratio of these two quantities. The velocity of escape from the earth at its surface is about 7 mi (11.3 km) per sec, or 25,000 mi per hr; from the moon's surface it is 1.5 mi (2.4 km) per sec; and for a body at the earth's distance from the sun to escape from the sun's gravitation, the velocity must be 26 mi (41 km) per sec.
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