jump ship

jump ship

English

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Verb

jump ship (third-person singular simple present jumps ship, present participle jumping ship, simple past and past participle jumped ship)

1. (nautical) To depart from a ship, especially without permission.

   As soon as the battleship docked in Singapore, Roger jumped ship, never to return.

2. (figurative) To leave something, especially suddenly or rapidly.

   I couldn't hack it as a teacher, so I jumped ship and flew back to Australia.

   • 2022 January 13, Polly Toynbee, “Finally the Tory papers have caught on that Johnson is a liar – what kept them?”, in The Guardian‎:

     The few stalwarts praising the prime minister’s non-remorse today will be of small comfort to him, given their ranks include Ann Widdecombe and Patrick O’Flynn of the Express, while another of their ilk, the Telegraph’s Allison Pearson, has jumped ship altogether.

Translations

depart from a ship

Chinese: Mandarin: 離船／离船 (líchuán), 棄船／弃船 (zh) (qìchuán) Finnish: hypätä laivasta Spanish: please add this translation if you can

leave suddenly

Chinese: Mandarin: 潛逃／潜逃 (zh) (qiántáo) Dutch: er tussenuit knijpen (slang) Finnish: hypätä veneestä Spanish: please add this translation if you can

Further reading

• “jump ship”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.