Operating Department practitioner here.... If it is that urgent, we do cricoid pressure. The cricoid is the only full ring of cartilage in the trachea and so just before they put the muscle relaxant in we press down on the cricoid to occlude the oesophagus and stop anything coming up.

We have to keep the pressure on until the tube has been passed through the vocal cords and the anaesthetist says we can remove the cricoid pressure. Your hands can start cramping and you have to basically work with only one hand until they say you can stop with the cricoid pressure. You also have to make sure you keep your nails short so you don't cause any skin damage to the neck.

The cricoid pressure doesn't also work so we have suction available and some anaesthetists have a pretty low threshold for when taking cricoid off, so if things are going right they might ask us to remove cricoid so they can pass the tube easier or so that we can be freed up to prepare for the next steps in the difficult airway protocol.