WHAT IS THE TRACHEA ANYWAY?
Trachea is the scientific name for the windpipe, the tube that connects the nose, mouth, and throat to the lungs. The trachea is meant to be a fairly rigid tube. It consists of muscle connecting a group of cartilage rings. The rings are actually not complete circles; they form a C with the open end of the C facing towards the animal’s back. This muscle covering the open end of the C is called the tracheal membrane. When the diaphragm (the flat muscle separating the abdomen from the chest cavity) flattens and the intercostal muscles (the muscles between the ribs) move, air is sucked into the lung. When the muscles move the opposite direction, air is pushed out of the lung. The trachea serves as a pipeline bringing air into the chest. Part of the trachea is in the throat but it also extends into the chest so that we can look at the trachea as having an intrathoracic portion (inside the chest) and an extrathoracic portion (outside the chest). WHY WOULD A TRACHEA COLLAPSE? Tracheas collaps
