windpipe
Americannoun
-
windpipes
plural
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of windpipe
Explanation
Your windpipe is the tube you use for breathing — it connects your larynx to your lungs. Every animal that uses lungs for breathing also has a windpipe. The windpipe is made of cartilage, and it allows air to flow freely in and out of your lungs. If your windpipe becomes inflamed or irritated, you'll cough, and if it's blocked by a wayward chunk of food you may need someone to pound hard on your back or give you the Heimlich maneuver to remove it. The medical term for windpipe is trachea.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
With the pressure inside my throat from the tube and the pressure outside the windpipe from my thyroid, maybe there was some damage to the nerves.
From Slate ● Apr. 18, 2026
In addition to farm work, she provides for her son day and night, including cooking and cleaning the ventilation tube in his windpipe.
From Barron's ● Jan. 29, 2026
It entails wrapping both arms around a choking victim from behind, making a fist just over the victim’s navel and thrusting upward sharply five times to eject an object that is obstructing the windpipe.
From New York Times ● Nov. 30, 2023
Intubation, the process of placing a breathing tube into the windpipe - which should only take a few minutes - did not occur for 18 minutes.
From BBC ● Oct. 23, 2023
He offered a hand to Nick, who ignored it and got unsteadily to his feet, rubbing his windpipe and glaring at us like some trapped and wounded beast.
From "The Shakespeare Stealer" by Gary L. Blackwood
If their windpipes are practically crushed inside their necks and their soft palates are elongated, frequently that is simply the way they are bred.
From Salon ● Sep. 4, 2023
Birds and reptiles have very different ways of producing sounds using the organs that surround their windpipes and lungs.
From New York Times ● Feb. 24, 2023
He provided artificial windpipes to 20 patients from countries that included Spain, Russian, Iceland, Britain and the United States.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 29, 2022
A year later, he began to implant synthetic windpipes seeded with stem cells isolated from the patients’ own bone marrow, claiming the cells would grow and integrate with the patients’ tissue.
From Science Magazine ● Jun. 16, 2022
Even that most doleful of Christian laments—“Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen”—sounded snappy and upbeat through these women’s windpipes as they sauntered along: “Nani oze mpasi zazo! Nani oze mpasi!”
From "The Poisonwood Bible" by Barbara Kingsolver
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
