scram

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• General-American, Received-Pronunciation: skrăm
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• General-American, Received-Pronunciation: /skɹæm/
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• Southern-England: Recorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
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• rhymes with -æm
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• CMU ARPABET: S K R AE1 M Digits mark lexical stress: 1 primary, 2 secondary, 0 unstressed.
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Probably either: * a clipping of scramble by apocope; or * from dialectal German schramm, the imperative singular form of schrammen (“to scratch, scrape”), from Late Middle High German schramm, schramme (“a graze, scratch”); further etymology unknown.

Uncertain; the verb is possibly derived from etymology 1. It has been suggested that the word is an acronym for phrases like “safety control rod actuator mechanism”, “safety cut rope axe man”, “safety control rod axe man”, and “safety control rods activation mechanism”, but these are most likely backronyms. The noun is probably derived from the verb.

The verb is a variant of dialectal English scramb (“to pull or rake together with the hands; to gather a handful of something from the ground; to scratch with the claws or nails; to pull down violently; to tear off; to maul about; a handful of something from the ground”), possibly related to Dutch schrammen (“to graze, scratch”) and German schrammen (“to scratch, scrape”); see etymology 1. The noun is derived from the verb.

See scram; the use of uppercase letters may be because the word is thought to be an acronym of phrases like “safety control rod actuator mechanism”, “safety control rod axe man”, and “safety control rods activation mechanism”, but these are most likely backronyms.

Origin unknown.

55 source translations are retained for this English entry.

• Chinese Mandarin: 停堆 — shutdown of a nuclear reactor (or, by extension, some other thing), often done rapidly due to an emergency
• Chinese Mandarin: 急停 — shutdown of a nuclear reactor (or, by extension, some other thing), often done rapidly due to an emergency
• Arabic: غَرَبَ (ḡaraba) — to leave in a hurry
• Bulgarian: махам се (maham se) — to leave in a hurry
• Bulgarian: пръждосвам се (prǎždosvam se) — to leave in a hurry
• Catalan: fotre el camp — to leave in a hurry
• Chinese Mandarin: 滾 /滚 (gǔn) — to leave in a hurry
• Czech: zdejchnout se — to leave in a hurry
• Czech: vypařit se — to leave in a hurry
• Czech: zmizet — to leave in a hurry
• Czech: vypadnout — to leave in a hurry
• Dutch: wegwezen — to leave in a hurry
• Finnish: häipyä — to leave in a hurry
• Finnish: ottaa hatkat — to leave in a hurry
• Finnish: lähteä lipettiin — to leave in a hurry
• French: décamper — to leave in a hurry
• French: décaniller — to leave in a hurry
• French: dégager — to leave in a hurry
• French: ficher le camp — to leave in a hurry
• French: se barrer — to leave in a hurry
• French: se casser — to leave in a hurry
• French: s'en aller — to leave in a hurry
• French: se tailler — to leave in a hurry
• French: se tirer — to leave in a hurry
• French: déguerpir — to leave in a hurry
• German: abhauen — to leave in a hurry
• German: abzischen — to leave in a hurry
• German: Land gewinnen — to leave in a hurry
• German: Reißaus nehmen — to leave in a hurry
• German: sich davonmachen — to leave in a hurry
• German: verduften — to leave in a hurry
• German: verschwinden — to leave in a hurry
• German: weggehen — to leave in a hurry
• Italian: andare via — to leave in a hurry
• Italian: smammare — to leave in a hurry
• Māori: hie — to leave in a hurry
• Portuguese: sumir — to leave in a hurry
• Portuguese: vazar — to leave in a hurry
• Romanian: se cărăbăni — to leave in a hurry
• Romanian: o șterge — to leave in a hurry
• Romanian: se tira — to leave in a hurry
• Russian: вали́ть (valítʹ) — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: irse — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: largarse — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: marcharse — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: retirarse — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: pirarse — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: pirárselas — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: esfumarse — to leave in a hurry
• Spanish: barajustar — to leave in a hurry
• Turkish: sıvışmak — to leave in a hurry
• Turkish: tüymek — to leave in a hurry
• Welsh: bachu hi — to leave in a hurry
• Chinese Mandarin: 停堆 — of a nuclear reactor or some other thing: to shut down, usually because of an emergency
• Chinese Mandarin: 急停 — of a nuclear reactor or some other thing: to shut down, usually because of an emergency