BAD, BAD wreck at Porsche Club event yesterday - MSR-C

[mitchntx]

Big Bend ...

2 cars got together and one spun off on driver's left about 2/3 the way through Big Bend. In the process, a lot of grass, mud and moisture was spread across the track, right at apex.

The spinning car managed to get going again and took off.

Glenn and I both looked at the corner worker station just before Big Bend and they never threw the debris flag. It's possible no one realized that there was debris on the track because BB is kind of in a hole.

A few cars came through and wiggled, but all recovered.

A pack of 4 racers entered BB. The lead car, a red Valkyrie racing Porsche did a tank slapper, with teh driver constantly trying to catch it and recover. It finally spun in the middle-outside of the track at about the crest of the hill.

Still no flag at the corner worker station.

Car 2 went low, car 3 went high, car 4 ... had no place to go.

Car 4 hit the red car broad side. I can only speculate that the 4th car was caught unaware as the 2 cars split in front of him leaving him a windshield full of 911 Porsche sitting sideways in the track.

It was a HARD impact.

The 4th car had the front of the car flush with the front tires. And the red car was hit just behind the front tire.

The driver of the red car had to be cut out of the car and was careflighted out as a precaution. The announcement was that he was OK, it was just a precaution.

The driver in the 4th car sat in his car for a long, long, LONG time. No one was attending to him, so I can only assume he was gathering his emotions after what had just happened.

Both cars are scrap.

Several things came up for me seeing all this unfold.

First ... I witnessed the driver in the red car fight hard to recover and maintain position. And in the end it damn near cost him his life. I see too many of us doing the same thing, losing control, fighting the car and trying to maintain position, ultimately spinning across the track in front of traffic. Folks scoff under their breath about HPDE. But that is where I was taught to drive it off, get out of the way of traffic and then rejoin. Remember, it's just a piece of plastic we're racing for.

Second ... I watched the driver in the 4th car sit in his vehicle for an excruciatingly long time ... probably 30 minutes. He saw everything from the front row. And I bet he knew the driver of the red car. I can only imagine the emotions I would feel if I were to hit someone in this group of comrades.

Third ... There was never a debris flag shown, just a standing yellow. It was pulled when the original, spinning car got moving again. Never a debris flag.

And after the accident, it was a solid 2 minutes before the red flag was shown. And then another 3 or 4 minutes before fire and rescue arrived. A corner worker was able to run from entry of LITTLE bend to the accident scene before Fire and rescue was 1/2 way there. Granted, it was muddy and they couldn't cut across the track. But, a red flag should have immediately been waving and Fire and rescue drive the 300 yards against the grain of the racers to get to the drivers involved. Thank the good Lord above there wasn't a fire.

Fourth ... Kudos to PCA for taking care of the family. We were at the clubhouse and the folks wearing yellow Tee shirts already had a plan in place shuttling wife and kids to the hospital before CareFlight ever left.

Fifth ...

Clifton, Todd, Adrian, David, Al, Glenn ...

Is there any kind of information conduit between the different sanctioning bodies to share lessons learned? As a racer, I would certainly like to see some sort of information sharing about what went wrong and what went right in these terrible situations and pray to God we never ever again have to put this plan into action.

[David Love AI27]

not sure which "David" you are refering to but here is my 2 cents...

Ask Adrian about recruting workers... it is getting harder and harder to staff events... I get emails from many groups asking me to work but my time is now divided between instructing and working on cars so I don't have the time to work corners any more.

I don't have a solution so I'm not pointing fingers but it does concern me when instructing to see an understaffed crew... I make an effort to point out areas of the track that are "blind" to the corner stations so my students are more careful in those areas... As drivers, track safety should be a major concern and we should step up and voice these concerns when we see a problem (for example when we see a worker reading a book or sitting down during a session)... Race control cannot monitor all the stations and I have NEVER been told to "mind my own business" when I have pointed out problems in the past...

We, the drivers, need to voice our concerns if we see a possible safety issue...

[mitchntx]

Actually, I was asking that question to the series director and race weekend leaders. But you bring up a very good point ...

Who makes the call on what flag to post at a particular corner?

Do the corner workers make a judgment call or do they wait of direction from race control?

Do the corner stations radio control, explain what they see and wait for control to give instruction about throwing a flag?

The procedure for going all the way around the track to reach a wreck just a few hundred yards from pit entrance seemed a poor practice. Thoughts?

[Waco Racer]

Mitch,

There is way too much information to cover in one post. I can answer your questions but most likely you have more before this thread is over. Also, I may not be able to effectively relay the information that we, race officials, go through in one weekend or even one on track incident like you describe. We have many conversations before, during, and after we work an event, just to make sure that we are all on the same page and that situations are handled properly.

With that said, the corner workers typically make the decision on flag conditions. However, there are some things that are out of a corner stations' line of sight that require contact with control to allow them to display the proper flag condition. Black flag and Red flags come from me or from control at my instruction. Each organization does things differently. Anyone is welcome to come stand by me and listen to a race on the main channel or buy me a cold beverage and I will explain some of our control procedures.

[David Love AI27]

Actually, I was asking that question to the series director and race weekend leaders. But you bring up a very good point ...

Who makes the call on what flag to post at a particular corner?

worker makes call on yellow, blue, yellow and red (debris) and white

Do the corner workers make a judgment call or do they wait of direction from race control?

Race control decides black, red and when to drop debris flag.

Do the corner stations radio control, explain what they see and wait for control to give instruction about throwing a flag?

Car off course = standing yellow, car on course or in dangerous position = waving yellow, if car remains in dangerous position and appears disabled race control may opt to black flag all to clear track or red flag if EV's are needed immediately. Corners do not post black or red flag without the direction of race control

The procedure for going all the way around the track to reach a wreck just a few hundred yards from pit entrance seemed a poor practice. Thoughts?

Finally, there is a movement within many sanctioning bodys to try and respond to incidents while cars are still on course because many or most drivers voice their complaints about loss of track time and delays in schedules. There is also a steadfast rule about ANYONE, including EVs, going counter race. You would not believe how many drivers don't understand the flag conditions or just flat out ignore them.

Think about it!!! How many of us complain to the directors or stewards about being off schedule but never say anything about a cornerworker reading a book or sitting down???

[bossskip302]

Mitch, if you had( or race/PC guys in charge) radio would that of helped, when the oil spill happened at MSR last year our crew guy had no idea what racing was all about however had the common sense to let Scott and I know about the mess within 30 seconds of the problem, thus saved us from sure body contact (at least me and a few ai drivers)
Radios work
Skip

[mitchntx]

Don't misunderstand folks ... I'm not complaining about the level of service we get.

I am concerned about the level of service in a timely manner. I'm just asking if the PROCEDURES need to be revisited and revised based upon lessons learned.

I can also acknowledge that track layout plays a huge role.

MSR-C, MSR-H and TWS all have "cross-over" paths so that EV don't have to navigate the whole track in order to arrive at an incident a couple hundred yards from pit entrance.

I take well over a minute to navigate the 1.7 at MSR-C at speed. EV require 2 or 3 times that. Like I said, it was an excruitiatingly long wait for F&R to get to the crash site exiting Big Bend.

Watching the fire truck and ambulance cruise around the track while the 2 cars are sitting in the track before us made it even worse.

A gravel road along the fence that parallels the front straight at MSR-C and connects to the flag station where we get the green flag would be sufficient.

Skip, I couldn't agree more ... if the Safety Broadcast had the information to pass along. The time from the initial spin that laid down the debris to the time of impact was 30-45 seconds.

Again .. please understand. I am not complaining or talking down to the corner workers, race control or fire and rescue. Everything happened at break-neck speed and I happened to be in an unfortunate position to see it all happen.

[dirwin]

Skip,

I was the first car in the mud in Houston following the "oil spill" and was behind the Mazda when it blew up. My problem was 2 fold with that deal. 1. the idiot was smoking somthing awful and drove past 3 flag stands with no black flag. 2. the idiot himself stayed on line and instead of going in the pit then went off line and back on again coming into the last corner leaving nobody any choice but driving through the oil. I am glad the safety broadcast was going for sure, but we almost got pounded even with it.

[bossskip302]

Scott and I use motorola radios that have saved our asses more than once, due to my stupidity the receiver that Boudy has rented us has never worked...my fault.However i feel very confident using our system with a person in the pit keeping us informed whats going on.....works with pro race teams, can work for our country asses
Skip

[Todd Covini]

Like Clifton said, stand by with him or I in Control some day and watch/listen to all that goes on behind the scenes. There's a lot that goes into it and a lot of communication that goes on. (Even moreso if we could get the AI/CMC Info Broadcast fully implemented!)

Regarding the sharing of best practices, I think Adrian's got Texas pretty locked up. Her Dad heads up the Safety Crews for many of the events and a lot of the same folks crew for a lot of the different events. I think if there's an oopsy that goes on in Texas, RaceBrat is likely going to hear about it first.

NASA really has the official/primary role for safety at the events.
Series Directors communicate among the other AI/CMC regions, but only act as liasons between the racers and NASA based upon what we see/hear.

IMO, there might be some improvements we could all do in the area of best-practices or lessons learned in the racing/opentrack community. However (with a capital H), in today's legal beagle age, and the fact that all these organizations are typically competing with each other in one way or another....the sharing of information is typically limited. (I'm not explaining it away...just stating an observation.)

Routine Lessons learned and near-misses have to be in a blameless society before it'll catch on....and we're frankly just not there yet.

-=- Todd