Great Escapes: Unraveling the World’s Wonders

In May 1979, a hot air balloon unexpectedly landed inside the exercise yard of Fleury-Mérogis Prison near Paris. Two inmates saw their chance and clambered into the basket. The startled balloonists were forced at knife-point to operate the burners. Floating over the prison walls, the prisoners made their daring aerial escape.

In the UK, the letter G is often associated with a number of things, including:

Gambroon
A kind of twilled linen cloth for lining.

Globiferous
Having a round or globular tip.

Grumous
Resembling or containing grume; thick; concreted; clotted; as, grumous blood.

Gymnastics
Athletic or disciplinary exercises; the art of performing gymnastic exercises; also, disciplinary exercises for the intellect or character.

Gyle
Fermented wort used for making vinegar.

Granulose
The main constituent of the starch grain or granule, in distinction from the framework of cellulose. Unlike cellulose, it is colored blue by iodine, and is converted into dextrin and sugar by boiling acids and amylolytic ferments.

Gymnosperm
A plant that bears naked seeds (i. e., seeds not inclosed in an ovary), as the common pine and hemlock. Cf. Angiosperm.

Goel
Yellow.

Grandiloquous
Grandiloquent.

Gastrohepatic
Pertaining to the stomach and liver; hepatogastric; as, the gastrohepatic, or lesser, omentum.

Gynaecium
The part of a large house, among the ancients, exclusively appropriated to women.

Glass-rope
A remarkable vitreous sponge, of the genus Hyalonema, first brought from Japan. It has a long stem, consisting of a bundle of long and large, glassy, siliceous fibers, twisted together.

Gymnosomata
One of the orders of Pteropoda. They have no shell.

Goblinize
To transform into a goblin.

Grandee
A man of elevated rank or station; a nobleman. In Spain, a nobleman of the first rank, who may be covered in the king's presence.

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In 1963, three men incarcerated inside Alcatraz Prison in San Francisco Bay hatched an elaborate, months-long escape plan. Using tools as crude as spoons and a drill fashioned from a vacuum cleaner, they slowly tunneled through their cell walls which led to unlocked utility corridors. Though assumed drowned, their bodies were never recovered.

The Libby Prison Escape in Richmond in 1864 remains the largest break-out from a Confederate prison during the American Civil War. Over 100 Union prisoners managed to tunnel out of the prison’s basement to freedom, assisted by a Union sympathizer. 59 soldiers succeeded in crossing back over into Union territory.

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In December 2011 in the Netherlands, a thief made his getaway in an unlikely vessel – a harness strapped beneath hundreds of helium party balloons. Airport authorities spotted him floating unsteadily in the balloon contraption but could not intercept this bizarre escape before the man parachuted safely back to earth and disappeared.

In 1970s East Germany, daredevils attempted to flee from behind the Iron Curtain by leaping border fences and sprinting into the forest hoping to evade armed guards. One man modified his car into a makeshift submarine to cross under the Baltic sea to Denmark though the primitive vessel nearly sank mid-journey.

In 1646 Lady Anne Vane disguised herself as a man to break her captured husband out of the Tower of London. Remarkably, the pair bluffed their way past the guards even insisting on stopping to have a drink on their way out! Though recaptured days later, their brief freedom remains legendary.

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In 1973 three men escaped Dublin’s Mountjoy Prison using a hijacked helicopter that audaciously landed inside the prison yard. Though initially reported as a bold success, later revelations showed it was an embarrassing, bungled effort. Still, brazen helicopter escapes occasionally reappear, though rarely with happy endings.

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During WWII’s Great Escape, 76 Allied pilots tunneled out of a German POW camp in a famous, mass break-out attempt. While 73 were swiftly recaptured, 3 pilots successfully crossed the border to safety. 50 recaptured men were executed as punishment which became a war crime after the Axis defeat. Though tragic, the bravery and ingenuity still amazes us.