Amazing. The guard looks rather proud of what one of his boys did. Has anyone ever thought of searching prisons for ingenious people of this sort, putting them all in a super prison (The Think Tank), and getting them to work solving some of the nation's problems? Just imagine? Could even work this up into a reality show -- Prison search.

This reminds me of the movie, 'Escape From Alcatraz' in which Clint Eastwood manages to tunnel out of the prison bit by bit with a spoon. I can't imagine that the TP rope would have held together without the cloth, however.

Even the roughest TP is made out of fibers like anything else. If enough sheets of it are braided or twisted (probably braided) they will become rather strong. The rope mentions he also used bedsheets. If I were faced with duplicating his task, I'd probably unwind 9 rolls of TP, and make each one a long string by rolling up the pieces lengthwise, then braid 3 of them, then braid the 3 braids together, then cut the bedsheet into thin strips and sort of wind it around the TP, covering the surface area so as to reduce the TP's exposure to water. I don't know if this makes sense to anyone but it seems like it would be pretty strong.

What I really want to know is how he didn't get all scratched up by the razor wire. Maybe he wrapped himself in TP too.

When I was a kid, I had a book of kids' "magic" tricks ("Amaze your friends!"). In that book was a "trick" that called for a Kleenex tissue. It said if you take a Kleenex and twist it up very tight, and ask a friend to grasp it in both fists and try to tear in in half, they will NOT be able to do it. The trick was that somehow the "magician" dips their fingers in water, takes the Kleenex, and having wet the middle, it then tears easily.

But the book was right; at least, as a kid, I could NOT tear a Kleenex ropelet in half. So it's totally feasible that you could make a pretty reasonable rope out of T.P. The penitentiaries will have to start putting in those little square-dispenser thingys.
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Fecal Matters.

I'd kinda like to try this. The rolls of TP here are that one-ply stuff that is on HUGE rolls, and in theory I've paid for it (fees, lease for the dorm, etc). I imagine twisting it into ropelets and braiding the ropelets might make a pretty nice rope.

As for the razor wire, well, maybe the scratches are worth it if it means freedom.

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"Double the flush, double the fun" --The Amazing Anus

If he saved up all his TP to make a rope, imagine the filthy state his asshole is in.

Filthy asshole or no, I'd have to imagine that being free, for a while anyway, is much better than being in prison. And the TP rope thing is very plausible if kept dry as AB2K said.
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Yes, those are my brown spots. Yes, those are your walls.

Perhaps he did not go without T.P. during his rope making period. Isn't it possible that he wiped with the paper, before twisting it up? It might even have helped the twisted paper to hold together.
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Sir SamDamnit!
The Emir of Crapistan