The Airway · Lungs
The windpipe — a ringed tube built so it can't collapse.
Below your voice box runs a tube about as wide as your thumb: the trachea, or windpipe. Run your fingers down the front of your neck and you can feel the ridges of the cartilage rings holding it open.
Those rings are the whole point. Every time you inhale, the pressure inside the airway drops — and a soft tube would suck itself shut. The rings are C-shaped, open at the back, so the oesophagus behind can bulge forward when you swallow a mouthful.
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