Airway

How to spell airway

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce airway

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does airway mean?

1. nounThe passage through which air reaches the lungs, from the nose and mouth down through the throat.
2. nounA designated corridor in the sky along which aircraft are routed by air traffic control.

Airway in a sentence

• The paramedic tilted the patient's head to clear the airway.

• The controller cleared the jet to follow the busy airway above the coast.

• A blocked airway can stop oxygen reaching the lungs within minutes.

• Bad weather forced traffic onto an alternative airway further south.

Where does airway come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is a transparent English compound, joining 'air' and 'way', both of which are very old words. 'Air' came into Middle English from Old French 'air', which traced back to the Latin 'aer' and ultimately the Greek 'aer', meaning the lower atmosphere we breathe, as opposed to the bright upper sky. 'Way' is a native Germanic word from Old English 'weg', meaning a path, road, or course of travel, and it shares its root with the verb 'to wend' and with German 'Weg'. The two were welded together in the nineteenth century to name a passage along which air travels, first in the context of mine ventilation. The medical sense (the passage from the nose and mouth to the lungs) and the aviation sense (a marked corridor for aircraft) both grew from that same plain idea of a route for air, which is why the spelling stays simply and reliably 'air' plus 'way'.

How the word is built

• air (the breathable atmosphere)
• way (path, passage)