A friend crashes new drag car, and then it burns to a crisp

[A/Fuel]

And get back to me when a couple of guys in shorts is an acceptable crew. The track owner is a racer for Gods sake. What part of that do you not understand?

[Stich496]

And get back to me when a couple of guys in shorts is an acceptable crew. The track owner is a racer for Gods sake. What part of that do you not understand?

so he was a racer.. for all we know he could've told them all there wasn't money for the pro crew.. at the gate and is why there are guys in shorts with fire ex. in their hands..
the guy ran, his choice.. no matter if the track owner was/is a racer or not..
hell you knew the same thing and you are a racer and didn't back your driver off the track..
hows that any different

[A/Fuel]

what ever dude. Just don't leave the doors locked on your helicopter when your getting ready to make a lap.....oh wait, the last time that happened was?
See the world and do yourself a favor and get out to a track this summer. Oh, they have guys walking around in firesuits at Morroco.

[Blazerteam]

Well...lookin at the vid..the throttle sure aint stuck.It looks like he got some kind of wobble in the car after the launch,and it didnt stop even if he just barely touched the gas pedal afterwards.

Rear suspension problems maybe?.

And that fire crew sure could have had more equipment,and a hour or two in firefightinlessons.

The battery should have been turned off,because then the gas would have stopped flowing..

Small things that could have saved the car.

Good thing your friend was ok Jeremy

[ford141]

I totally agree on the lack of preparedness of the crew. Accidents happen when racing, but that is why you race at a RACE TRACK, because it is a safe venue with safety personnel present. When we go to truck pulls around here, even the most backyard, podunk, redneck pulls where only a handful of trucks show up has a fire crew and truck present. They usually "rent" the local volunteer dept for the day, who are more than happy to get paid to watch the truck pulls. We don't have high speeds, and I can only remember of maybe 2 fires within the 10 years that I've been going to the pulls, but the crew is still there every week.

[Brian Lohnes]

The first guy that runs to the back to the car kills the battery in the video, or at least he appears to. I'm thinking that car has a mechanical pump anyway as it was a blown alcohol mill.

The track appears to have an ambulance. If you watch the second video, when the camera pulls out there is an ambulance there. With their firefighting ability exposed, I'm not sure I'd want to see how good they were at first aid/medecine.

How much does NED pay for fire and ambulance? Well, they own a fire truck and an ambulance on their own and they hire off-duty fire and emts to work the races...who have all been put through the SFI extrication and specific fire fighting training. They are all equipped with the proper gear and all the systems on the safety equipment work. The track employs them for race days, they are not being rented from the town, they are employees of the track.

One of the great ironies in this video is that the dually "safety" truck looks to be an ex-NHRA Safety Safari vehicle.

Mark, they didn't race at Norwood airport, they raced at the Norwood Speedbowl in 1968. The 1/8 mile strip was named "NED South" and it was a one year only experiment that ended badly when the neighbors went nuts over the noise. Your assertion that I wouldn't have liked how things were back then is flawed at best. You can't apply modern standards to stuff that happened 40 years ago. That's dumb.

The nostalgia drags are a problem? Bullshit. How about some evidence of stuff being done in a manner that is unsafe or at tracks that are blatantly as unprepared as Capitol was for this event?

I agree 100% that the racer accepts risk when getting into a race car. As Scott wrote, people die doing this stuff and there's lots of situations that come along that safety people cannot help, but there are LOTS that they can help and potentially make the difference between someone living or dying. If Vinny were knocked out inside that car from the impact, he would be dead, plain and simple. The problem comes in when a place represents itself as something it isn't. "Yeah, we have a fire truck, and a safety crew." -- What do you take that to mean? Me, as a reasonable person takes that to mean that the facility has the people and equipment to help me in a situation if I need it. Unfortunately, in this case it meant, "Yeah, we have a truck that looks like it works but does nothing, we have a few guys who know what the shape of a fire extinguisher is, and we have a volunteer fire department in our county that can show up if we call them to help sweep up the remaining cinders of your race car."


TC -- you can do that with the go-kart, you'd just have to comply with the motorcycle safety standards (full leathers, etc).

[SpiderGearsMan]

After that video the other day, I truly believe that anyone who races a car with any balls at Capitol Raceway probably has a death wish from here on out.

Why?

The "safety crew" is a bunch of guys with shorts on, who have no ####ing clue what to do. Reportedly the track fire truck was either inoperable or had no water in it. INEXCUSABLE.

The car sat there and BURNED TO THE ####ING GROUND FOR 20 MINUTES before a volunteer fire crew showed up and put out whatever was left.

The guy who owns this track is an NHRA Pro Stock racer and he should be ashamed of himself, as a professional drag racer to operate a facility in this manner. Disgusting.

at a super chevy show at raceway park ..a guy had the worst crash I ever saw at the drags ..12 second chevelle , no cage ,
it was a hot day and I was sitting in the temporary stands down by the finish line , looking at my shoes ..a girl sitting a couple of rows up said "oh my God " I looked at the track
the rearend locked up
snap the driveshaft driving the pinion yoke into the pavement , the rear axle tore away and the car went end over end [hood to trunk ] about eight times ..the roof was caved in
I had to hand it to the englishtown safety crew , they were on it as fast as the safety safari at a national event , which reinforced in my mind that raceway park is all around the finest drag strip on the planet

[SpiderGearsMan]

old chassis are not allowed on the track anymore , thus the no driveshaft cacklefest

[BBR]

Damn the spelling in this thread!!!!

Damn it all to hell!!!!

TC, 1/4 miles must be longer on your side of the country because around here they are all 1320' lol ;-)

[Guest]

you guys are forgetting , why in the hell did he wack the throttle again ...that was clearly his fault....

clearly a case of having lots of money and no driving skills!

[TheSilverBuick]

You can clearly see the butterfly's openning and closing, he was pedalling it. As for the track crew...

The drag strip in Wendover here is about as redneck and dangerous as that, probably more so. I've only been there once and I "may" go back simply because it's only 120 miles from here. But my experience there was:

1) Zero tech inspection
2) Cars running 10's with passengers wasn't a problem.
3) ZERO safety preparedness.

My car was vapor locking by the top end of 2nd gear (with the 3.70's) and on my third run it vapor locked so badly the engine quit and I coasted to a stop. I got out of the car, popped the hood checked the throttle, cranked it a few times, etc. I was out there five or so minutes before someone from the track made it out there on a truck and the first thing they said was "We thought you were on fire". Besides the fact there was no smoke, it was a FIVE minute response also by guys in shorts with 2lb fire extinguishers. Watching some of the cars and motorcycles run made me pretty nervous, jeans were "good enough" for 9 second motorcycle runs.

[Stich496]

you guys are forgetting , why in the hell did he wack the throttle again ...that was clearly his fault....

clearly a case of having lots of money and no driving skills!

what and place blame on the driver/owner..
glad you said it not me, as I'd be nailed to a cross

[Beagle]

you guys are forgetting , why in the hell did he wack the throttle again ...that was clearly his fault....

clearly a case of having lots of money and no driving skills!

It's a sign of inexperience... and sadly, has become all too common. Too much money into the race or too much ego maybe? As much as the response time from the crash truck blows, I am always amazed to watch guys try and recover when they are way out of shape.

I'm with Brian on this one for the most part. It's pretty evident that the track didn't have the support crew for cars with that much nuts. Oddly, I see Mark's point too. You buys your ticket and you takes your chances. In a completely strange twist, I also agree with TC - let a few burn to the ground and I bet the stands fill right up.


James is just mad cuz TC's quarter mile is longer than a quarter mile in Texas, and we all know EVERTHING is bigger in Texas.

It's sad to see the car-b-que.

[Orange65]

All this discussion leads to the question- how many of us actually check out the emergency services at a track prior to running or do we ASSUME it will be there adequately enough to take care of anything that happens? I have seen two cars burn to the ground due a lack of trained people and filled fire extenguishers. It happens all too often. I ran at the same track a few months later... didn't give it a second thought.

As for me- it has been a long time since I ran down a drag strip. BUT when I do again, I will probably not look once at the safety crew. And I will accept that I may lose my ride or my life.... but if that was what was on my mind, I would not climb into a race car to begin with.

[Stich496]

All this discussion leads to the question- how many of us actually check out the emergency services at a track prior to running or do we ASSUME it will be there adequately enough to take care of anything that happens? I have seen two cars burn to the ground due a lack of trained people and filled fire extenguishers. It happens all too often. I ran at the same track a few months later... didn't give it a second thought.

As for me- it has been a long time since I ran down a drag strip. BUT when I do again, I will probably not look once at the safety crew. And I will accept that I may lose my ride or my life.... but if that was what was on my mind, I would not climb into a race car to begin with.

but I'll bet if you built an alky powered monster you'd spend the 5-7 bills to have an onboard fire system..
I've only gone down the track with 3 different new builds.. and everytime it was that cars first time down the track..
it was a few solo runs.. so if the car had an "new build bug" it didn't take out another guys car.. and if it was all over the place. let off.. even the first run on happy gas,I asked for a solo run, the track was more than happy to, run the car solo