Porsche wreck at Cresson, 2/24/08

[michaelmosty]

Below is a link to a video I saw on the Nasaforums.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nULN9izjoSI

Apparently the driver put 2-off going into ricochet which caused him to shoot across track and into disaster.

[ShadowBolt]

Is everyone okay?

JJ

[Fbody383]

Apparently the people involved are ok.

Passenger Story (http://bimmer.roadfly.com/bmw/forums/m-lounge/8846570-1.html)

[AllZWay]

WOW....that is a violent wreck. Glad to hear they are okay.

[mitchntx]

From David's link ...



The track was set up in the 3.1 configuration. We were coming up the hill from the new section of the track to the old section of the track, in the counterclockwise direction. Because the car is so strong, we were going at least 100mph up the hill.


In the 3.1 configuration, that is the fastest section of track, now. In my car, I fall just a tad short of the front straight speeds seen at TWS.

Cresting the hill before Ricochet, the car gets really light. It's insane ...

[AI#97]

From David's link ...



The track was set up in the 3.1 configuration. We were coming up the hill from the new section of the track to the old section of the track, in the counterclockwise direction. Because the car is so strong, we were going at least 100mph up the hill.


In the 3.1 configuration, that is the fastest section of track, now. In my car, I fall just a tad short of the front straight speeds seen at TWS.

Cresting the hill before Ricochet, the car gets really light. It's insane ...

Any way to get that link to work? It comes up as private?...

Mitch, I seriously doubt the speeds you are quoting. There is no way in you are doing 140mph going up that hill or even 125. It is the hairiest section of track and will certainly catch the unexpecting off guard VERY quickly, but I would still like to see us race on it.

[GlennCMC70]

a CMC car doesnt do 140 at TWS. i can see over 100 pretty easy. on the 1.7 i normally short shift before ricochet and the top of 3rd is 100. on the 3.1 i can see 120 there. plus how often have you run the 3.1 Matt? me, zero.

[AI#97]

a CMC car doesnt do 140 at TWS. i can see over 100 pretty easy. on the 1.7 i normally short shift before ricochet and the top of 3rd is 100. on the 3.1 i can see 120 there. plus how often have you run the 3.1 Matt? me, zero.

I have run the 1.3 a lot and have yet to do the 3.1 at speed in a speedy car. The G37 I was riding in teh passenger seat in was barely getting 85-90 coming up the hill and sadly I felt it might have been as fast as a CMC car! They are really great cars for what they are. If you want to talk about getting the car "light", crest the hill going into the soup bowl full tilt in an AI car!!! I did it once, I will NEVER do it again! The launch in Houston has NOTHING on that! :shock:

Maybe if I could open the vid and see the speed a GT3 is carrying through there, that might change my mind....however, I think the guys in this RACE group would figure it out and know how to drive. I don't know the situation with the guy in the P-car however if he is the "typical" p-car driver...I chalk this one up to driver error. When the passenger account is that the driver "didn't realize he had two wheels off"....that pretty much spells it out for me and why I have gotten out of a couple of advanced students cars in the last year even before a session is over. It also makes me sort of rethink my helmet choice when I instruct. I have been using a new Motorcycle helmet to save some wear and tear on my race helmet but I may change that scenario, especially if I have a student with harnesses and will use my HANS...

[mitchntx]

I have run the 1.3 a lot and have yet to do the 3.1 at speed in a speedy car.

I make the "hairpin" high in 3rd and go to 4th at track out and hold it to the floor through the kink to the right, the transition, clipping the curb at Wagon Wheel on driver's left.

Just past the curb, I see the shift light, which is set at 5300, but hold it in 4th till I brake, just as I crest the hill.

I see the shift light in 4th just beyond the S/F line at TWS.

So, speeds are similar, and like I said, a tad short of the front straight at TWS.

[mitchntx]

Any way to get that link to work? It comes up as private?...


I saw it earlier. It was from a car exiting Big Bend and you see a car in the distance tumbling end over end, off track on driver's left and coming to rest at track out of Ricochet.

No detail, just a car in the far off distance.

[Tex89]

Linky no work. Anyone have the password?

David

[Adam Ginsberg]

I ran the 3.1 a year or so ago in the CMC car - coming off the 1.3 towards Ricochet is a damn fast section of track. It's been awhile, but IIRC, I'm just about at the top of 4th as I hit the brakes before turn in.

I love the 1.3, as well as the 3.1, and really hope we get a chance to race the 3.1 soon.

[jeffburch]

:roll: LOL! :roll:


Youtube "Broadcast yourself" (except when you wanna be pompous moron and make your stuff private.)

jb

[Rsmith350]

The link worked last night! It was one you had to watch a couple times to see what actually happened. Guess Someone saw how many hits it was getting and decided to get "pompous" :lol:

[AllZWay]

I watched a couple of times yesterday.

I think their speeds are pretty accurate also.

Normally I am around at least 90 mph at Ricochet doing the 1.7.....and only ran the 3.1 a few laps while shaking down my CMC car and so I can't really say how much faster the 3.1 would be....but you have a longer straighter shot...so I am sure you would gain speed through that section

If you read the other link....the passenger said it was driver error. Sounds like he put two wheels off early and then in the process of tyring to correct the two wheels off.... ended up turning in for the corner too early.

[AI#97]

:roll: LOL! :roll:


Youtube "Broadcast yourself" (except when you wanna be pompous moron and make your stuff private.)

jb

That or he is staring the uphill battle with his insurance company for a GT3 P-car to be replaced! :lol: :shock:

[Fbody383]

** Sorry. This is from the link at Roadfly **

It was a street legal 911 GT3 Ruf that was driven to the track.

I rode in the car with the driver. The video is from a driver in another 911 on the track who was coming out of Big Bend.

The car has a roll bar, racing seats, 6 point harnesses, no window nets, and we both had racing suits on. We were using a Chatterbox mic system, going over his line during the first 2 run sessions of the day. I had just put down my face shield because a piece of dirt got in my eye.

The track was set up in the 3.1 configuration. We were coming up the hill from the new section of the track to the old section of the track, in the counterclockwise direction. Because the car is so strong, we were going at least 100mph up the hill. After we crested the hill, we started down towards the turn in point on the right side of the track. About 20-30 feet short of the turn in cone, we had two wheels go off on the right. The driver didn’t realize that we had two wheels off, and started turning the car left. We then shot left across the track, and we were facing the inside edge curbing, about 30 feet short of the apex cone. I thought to myself, “this is going to really mess up his front spoiler. I bet these are expensive…” The front left tire hit the curbing, then the middle of the car between the wheels, and then the right tire. The impact was so fast and hard that I remember everything going black, and hearing heavy, crunching sounds, and the sound of our weight skipping on rocky dirt with gaps in the noise. I had no sense of up or down, but remember getting thrown around violently. I do remember thinking to myself, “Well, at least I have my will in order and the medical directive is all set up if this doesn’t work out well…”

I don’t remember coming to a stop, but we ended rightside up, on the trackout side of the turn, towards the lake, facing the direction of the track if we had been on it. I remember being pulled out of the car, and later found out that the guy from the 911 behind us (you can see it in the video) was the first one to us, and he pulled me out. The driver unbuckled my harnesses, and I was able to get up and walk away, dizzy. I lost the sense of time, but the EMS crew was there very fast, as I was sitting down in the grass when I realized one of the EMS guys was talking to me. I started gaining my senses back at that point, but my memory was fuzzy.

The driver was able to get out also, and we were both checking on each other and the damage. The only physical mark on either one of us was a small cut above his nose. I had lost the eyeport shield from my helmet, and the Chatterbox system was broken and laid about a dozen feet away. The engine was on fire which they were putting out, and the front right tire was gone. The front end of the car was squished into the middle of trunk, and the left tire was jammed at about a 45 degree angle from vertical. The passenger seat was tilted towards the door, so I’m not sure if it shifted when the bottom of the car hit the curbing, or that it shifted during one of the rollovers. The rear spoiler and a bunch of other parts were scattered on the infield, across the track, and the trackout area of the grass. The roof was solidly intact, and just dented down about a few inches. The airbags had blown, and I didn’t ever see them coming or going, so I don’t know when they inflated. The windshield frame was intact, and I can’t remember what the actual windshield looked like.

The MSR crew and EMS team did a great job getting to us, and cleaning up the mess. I had driven my truck out there, and told the EMS that I would drive back to Dallas and go to the ER there. I was starting to get a big headache, and knew that my neck and muscles were going to be in a lot of pain. The driver called a friend who was coming out to pick him up.

We rode back in the MSR pickup to one of the garages, while pulling the car on a flat bed trailer. As you can expect, there was quite a crowd by that point. I don’t have any pictures of the car, but I don’t think it will be repaired. One of the drivers told us he had video of the accident, and showed us his hi def camcorder with the footage.

I left Cresson and started driving back to Dallas. Realizing that I would be in the ER waiting room for a few hours, I stopped at Burger King for some tasty chicken strips (as previously disseminated by my PR Firm of Rob/Ron/Curry Enterprises). This was the first time that I realized that I had some injury from the chin strap of the helmet. It cut up my throat and bruised by skin and esophagus, and I took a small chunk out of the side of my tongue when I bit it during a rollover. While quite the finger food, it was hard to swallow the delectable bird, but I soldiered on.

When I got to Dallas, Mary and I went to Baylor ER, and waited for about an hour for the triage station. The nurse’s eyes bugged out when I told her what happened, and she was wondering why and how I drove all the way back to Dallas. They then put me in a neck collar to hold my head still, in the event that I had brain bleeding. I felt ok, but the soreness was starting to really get cranked up.

They brought me into the ER bay, and threatened to cut off my favorite Spam t-shirt. I protested enough that they left it on me, untouched by the destructive blades of a pair of scissors, and hooked up the cardio equipment to my chest to get some readings. They then took me to the CAT scan, which strangely enough has a small enough hole for a cat, and they jammed me in there for a few minutes. I felt like I was back in the womb, except it smelled like Pine-Sol.

Next, they did some Xrays, asked me a bunch of questions, and asked about the accident some more. The driver called me while I was there to check in, and said he was going to go to the doctor’s office the next day. My attending doctor said he needs to go right away to the ER because if his brain is bleeding, he won’t see it coming and it will kill him quickly. So the driver and his wife went to the ER for their checkup (he’s ok also).

I got to see the video last night on Youtube, and was shocked at the violence of the crash. I got a much better video today with higher resolution, and it was even more surprising to see how it all happened. I can’t believe we lived through that.

Lessons Learned:
-------------------------
Rollbars are great. That one saved us.

I need to look into a HANS or similar head/neck restraint.

The harnesses and racing seats worked great. I’m sore on my entire upper body from getting thrashed around against the roof, door, harnesses, and my helmet strap. My legs, knees, etc. are surprisingly unbruised or sore.

[Al Fernandez]

Wow...havent been able to see any videos but a great write up by that guy.