From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishextricateex‧tri‧cate /ˈekstrɪkeɪt/ verb [transitive] 1 ESCAPEto escape from a difficult or embarrassing situation, or to help someone escapeextricate yourself/somebody from something How was he going to extricate himself from this situation?2 REMOVEto remove someone from a place in which they are trappedextricate somebody/yourself from something Firemen had to extricate the driver from the wreckage.→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
extricate• A complicated story unfolds, with Mitchum desperately trying to extricate himself from the trap.• It is not known when Napoleon managed to extricate himself from this chaos.• They fired away with wild abandon, but luckily with little accuracy, and he was able to extricate himself.• Gao Yang had an unobstructed view of the man extricating his foot from the pot.• At the same time he arranged for Burgess to be sent home to extricate Maclean before the net closed.• It took firemen almost an hour to extricate the driver from the wrecked car.• By nightfall all the rifle companies had been over-run; some sections, and platoons from these companies extricated themselves at nightfall.extricate yourself/somebody from something• He had good taste and was most helpful in extricating one from awkward situations.• I helped Professor Cousins extricate himself from his chair.• This one is about the difficulty of extricating oneself from Internet entanglements, and specifically about bringing e-mail exchanges to an end.• He can speak eloquently of the need to reduce the size of government and extricate it from our private lives.• They can also help a floundering organization extricate itself from the depths of a self-inflicted malaise.• A complicated story unfolds, with Mitchum desperately trying to extricate himself from the trap.• It is not known when Napoleon managed to extricate himself from this chaos.extricate somebody/yourself from something• I helped Professor Cousins extricate himself from his chair.• He can speak eloquently of the need to reduce the size of government and extricate it from our private lives.• Then he turned, extricating himself from the clutter round his feet, and went, with great dignity, downstairs.• It is easiest to extricate rabbits from the nets if you kill them first.• Gao Yang had an unobstructed view of the man extricating his foot from the pot.• A complicated story unfolds, with Mitchum desperately trying to extricate himself from the trap.• It is not known when Napoleon managed to extricate himself from this chaos.Origin extricate (1600-1700) Latin past participle of extricare, from tricae “small difficulties” 