While this video maybe a couple years old, the footage is all time in our book. When you see a top fuel hydroplane literally “wheelie” itself up and over backwards at the hit of the throttle it nearly defies all description. This boat is called the Toxic Rocket (which is a flipping awesome name, BTW) and the driver inside for this video is Glen Wilson. Amazingly, this was the first time the thing had hit the water. It was a brand new piece for the team when this incident happened in 2011.
We have heard stories and seen photos of front engine dragsters doing stuff like this and we have all seen video of top fuelers having blow overs at mid and down track on a quarter mile strip, but I never knew that one of these nitro swilling aquatic maulers was capable of doing this to itself. Having virtually no understanding of what would cause this, I’ll leave that up to you but it certainly illustrates how effectively these top fuel hydroplanes put the power to the water.
The other thing you will see in this video is the safety measured built into these watercraft. After the boat flips over you can quickly see the drivers capsule floating safety away from the hull. Had the driver still been “attached” to the hull the capsule would have been submerged and we have shown you video of how horrifying that scene is (the drivers do have an air supply but it is still terrifying to see the cockpit fill up like a fishtank).
By all accounts, Wilson was OK but we’re sure he wasn’t happy about what the brand new hydroplane looked like. Apparently this happened at the last event of the 2011 season, so at least he had the winter to get everything all back together. We have two angles of the crash below. It really is something else. A power wheelie over backward on water. Who the hell would have believed that to be possible?!
PRESS PLAY BELOW AND WATCH BOTH ANGLES OF THIS AMAZING VIDEO!
Those boats have counter rotating propellers, twisting through what’s called a W drive. They can really dig. The leave on those boats is just hard as fuel cars. Very impressive if you ever get the chance, go see them.
yea they hole shot !!!! it will set your eyes back in your head !!!
GREAT RUSH
cheese slicer
Question-whats the “track” clean up like? Do they put divers down there right away to fish out the engine + everything else that sinks? Or wait till the end of the day?
Gawd-your hull is destroyed-do you have to wait till they find your motor to go home? “Didja happen to find my dry sump pump while you were down there?”
You crash a car, you can put whats left in the trailer + get your parts-good + destroyed back -but what happens with a boat? Do you go home with 20% os what you showed up with?
Nice to see how everybody hauled ass to go see if he was ok