Learn English – Plane took off [from] the runway

phrasal-verbsprepositional-phrasesprepositions

What if a phrasal verb ends in the preposition needed to connect a noun?

The plane took off the runway. (The plane was ON the runway, and therefore preposition OFF is preferred)

The plane took off from the runway.

I wanted to use 'off' not 'from', but I have never seen double 'off'.

If I am on a plane, I will come off the plane at the end.

He licked the chocolate off his fingers. (It was on his fingers)

If a plane is on something, it will…off something.

That is why I want to use 'off', but since double 'off' is incorrect, I apparently have to enjoy preposition 'from'.

Here is what I found:

the 787 takes off of the runway – http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2305539

Best Answer

First, the phrasal verb is indeed take off, which means:

take off (phrasal verb) To leave the ground and begin flight; to ascend into the air

Second, you can use a preposition after a phrasal verb:

The plane took off from the runway.

Third, we need to be careful about omitting the prepositions, because sometimes phrasal verbs can mean different things:

take off (phrasal verb) To remove

So, without a preposition, we could say:

The bulldozer took off the runway, leaving nothing but brown dirt.

Fourth, it is possible to use the same preposition found in the phrasal verb immediately after the phrasal verb; it's not "incorrect." So, if you really wanted to, you could say:

The plane took off off the runway.

However, I'd recommend rewriting that, for a couple reasons:

  • Although English doesn't have a rule strictly prohibiting identical consecutive words, they can still be awkward, so it's probably best to avoid them when possible
  • Since we know that airplanes normally take off using runways, adding the phrase "off the runway" doesn't really add much useful information

That said, there are other examples I can think of where the last word of a phrasal verb might match the proposition immediately following it:

  • The hotel was filling up fast, but we checked in in time to get a room.

  • He came around around twenty minutes ago.

  • I passed out out by the meadow.

  • She had no one to root for for the rest of the tournament.

Like I said, though, there are often simple ways to improve such sentences – which is probably one reason you don't run across them very often. For example, you can change the prepositional phrase or the verb:

  • The hotel was filling up fast, but we checked in early enough to get a room.

  • The hotel was filling up fast, but we arrived in time to get a room.

  • He came around about twenty minutes ago.

  • He wandered by around twenty minutes ago.

  • I passed out over near the meadow.

  • I fainted out by the meadow.

Or sometimes you can simply rearrange the sentence:

  • For the rest of the tournament, she had no one to root for.
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