Defend against checkmate: moving away

You know how to defend a piece. And that you can use the same methods to defend against check. You can also use them to defend against checkmate. We start with moving away to escape checkmate.

Sometimes, your king can move away without any problems. Example 1 shows this.
At other times, you need to create a bit of room for the king. This is called making air or luft (the German word for ‘air’).

How this works is shown in exampes 2 and 3.

What do you have to do?
Defend against checkmate by moving away. Play your king or make luft first. Remember: the space you create has to be a propper flight square.