We can say withouth fear of contradicting ourselves on this one that the video below is the scariest pulling truck incident we have ever seen. The very healthy 2WD truck leaves the starting line in a pretty jarring and violent fashion and just when it really starts to get a head of steam behind it, the truck explodes and is immediately filled with fire. We’re not sure if the sled operator has a release that he activated to free the truck or what because just after the explosion, the truck does rocket away from the sled down course before the driver (completely enveloped in flames) gets the truck stopped and rescue crews run up to blast the fire out with their extinguishers. You can hear the motor still running as the truck is sitting there and after the initial shock of the incident wore off, you can hear people go into a panic because they understand the driver has been in the truck for a very long time.
Some real rocket scientists in the crowd are seemingly trying to downplay the severity of the situation by saying, “He has a fire suit on…” Obviously those guys are not aware that if you are sitting in fire, your ass is grass and your jacket wasn’t designed to be used to walk into a blazing hot fire and sit there. In the video, it appears that the transmission may have exploded and started the whole blaze as the fire is definitely coming from the rear of the engine and it seems to start lower and then build up.
This is a bad one, like an old school Whit Bazemore Fast Orange funny car level of fire. Never have we EVER seen anything like this in a pulling truck! Explosions yes, but a huge sustained fire? That’s a scary new one.
PRESS PLAY BELOW TO SEE INSANE CARNAGE ON THE PULLING COURSE!
Amazing presence of mind that the driver had to get it stopped. Pulling sleds don’t have any type of “release” on them, in fact they want to keep the truck attach by any means to make sure they don’t have a runaway truck. This was either a hitch failure or the hook just bounced off.
All serious pulling machines nowadays are required to have a breakaway switch so that the ignition gets killed immediately if the truck breaks free. Either they didn’t hook up the switch or the switch didn’t work. That was bad, but could have been way worse.
The clutch wasn’t working right. The bouncing simultaneously over-revved the motor pushing out the head gasket and tearing out the drawbar taking the kill switch with it. American rules don’t require a relay on the mag kills so the wire flopped around never grounding out. Best thing Kreikemeyer did before he rolled out was shove it in neutral. He’s in the Burn ICU with 3rd degree burns on 60 percent of his body and needs your prayers.
Any way to send a card to the driver? Scarey incident for sure
Matthew Kriekemeyer
Burn ICU
St. Elizabeth Regional Medical Center
555 S. 70th St.
Lincoln, NE 68510
Thats really bad news about the driver. I hope he pulls through and is able to get on with his life.
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