When the person in a cartoon steps inside a loop of a rope on the ground and onto a trap, and the rope grabs the ankle so quickly and lift up high to raise the person upside-down and hanging? How does this work in real life?

Question

When the person in a cartoon steps inside a loop of a rope on the ground and onto a trap, and the rope grabs the ankle so quickly and lift up high to raise the person upside-down and hanging? How does this work in real life?

In: Physics

Answer 1

It’s called a “snare trap”. You can google that to get a diagram for how they work. Basically, you store tension in a rope by bending a tree branch back, securing it with a fragile trigger, and then having loop that will tighten when the end is pulled. If something disturbs the loop or rope, the fragile trigger gets loose, the branch pulls on the rope, and the loop then closes around whatever disturbed the loop.

If you run the tense rope over a tall tree branch too, it will lift whatever it ensnares into the air. But really, if you’re using snare traps to small animals, just getting them caught in a loop is usually enough. There’s no need to hoist them into the air.