32 replies to this topic

[Nathan]

PLEASE NOTE PEOPLE !!! THE DISCUSSION IN THIS THREAD GETS RATHER GRAPHIC SO IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO THIS SORT OF THING, PLEASE READ NO FURTHER...


THOSE PARTICIPCATING PLEASE TRY TO KEEP THE DETAILS TO THE MINIMUM NECESSARY TO DISCUSS THE TOPIC INTELLIGENTLY.

We now return you to regular programming...;)

Williams

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I'm not sure if this is too early or what. But I know there are some curious people out there. Sorry if this has been posted already.

I decided not to actually place the picture in this thread, rather just the link. It is a picture over looking the cockpit of Dale Earnhardts car from Daytona.

Im going to warn you there are some disturbing area's. You may notice his goggles on the floor, the bent steering wheel and cut-up roll cage and some other things I wish not to mention.

http://image.iwon.co...rs/mdf17616.jpg

Sorry if I have offended anyone.

[100cc]

ouch.

[Ross Stonefeld]

I thought NASCAR said the car was "hidden" what the hell are photos like that doing online

[RacerX]

NASCAR is now saying that Earnhardt had a broken seat belt, but are stopping short of saying whether that contributed to his death. Dr. Bohannon (the doctor from the original press conferences) speculated that DE's fatal injuries occured when his chin hit the steering wheel.

[Mr T]

RacerX

In that case, could he have survived had he worn a full face helmet?

[RacerX]

It sure seems that with a full face helmet and the HANS device he would have had a better chance of survival. Maybe he still would not have survived, who knows? It amazes me that NASCAR allows the open face helmets at all. Dale Jr. still wears one.

[Ross Stonefeld]

He hit the wheel with his chin with enough force to bend it, with an open face helmet, but no facial injuries?

[Zoe]

Ross,

thats sounds fishy to me as well (see the related thread on DE's seatbelt).

Maybe it is best to just sit back, relax, drink a cup of tea and wait for more details to surface...

Zoe

[RacerX]

Ross,

I agree that sounds very fishy to me also. The photo, however does appears to show some blood to the right of the driver's seat. Perhaps this is from a facial injury we have not been informed of.

[Jere J. Penttinen]

I think there's blood all over the upper part of the steering wheel.(right side of it in the picture). I reckon that would support the "chin against steering wheel" theory. That thing about no facial injury sure is fishy, but they could've initially said because they didn't want to let people know what kind of damage was done to DE's face because it could have been pretty damn disturbing.

What about the other driver (can't remeber the name) who tried to approach DE's car after that accident but "just had a look in and turned away sickened" or something like that. And I think I read somewhere that the doctor who arrived to scene could tell right away that there wasn't much he could do anymore.

[Ross Stonefeld]

Adam Petty had a lot of blood too. The basalar fractures destory lots of big blood veins and arteries

[Sudsbouy]

I also wondered about the unlikely combination of no facial injuries and the statement he impacted the steering wheel with his chin. I am pretty sure NASCAR is going to be more interested in the PR spin than getting the facts out.

Thank you.

[BARnone]

I have read that he had a skull fracture running from the front of the head to the back. No article I have read said he DIDN'T have facial injuries.

[LB]

The blood is possible from a basular fracture. It is reported that when Gonzalo Rodriguez suffered the same injury he "bled out". According to the doctors at the scene he died before the car flipped. The majority of the blood was on the barrier not in the cockpit. Gonzalo apparently had no other injuries. This comes from the articles on the HANS devise that were on here after the tragic death of Earnhardt.

It is possible that NASCAR are trying to 'cover up ' the possibility that they were the cause of Dale Earnhardts death. By not implementing the HANS devise and full face helmets. remember there is always the American spectre of legal action.

[pRy]

These little details are often kept from the press, esspecially when cause of death isn't fully known at first. To say "death was instant" and to use brain injury is often an easier way to deal with what may have been a messy situation for fans and the public.
I recall when Senna died, people did not run to the press saying how he had a hole in his head from a suspension arm, information like that usually comes later to those who are prehaps still interested in the details when a trial comes about, or an investigation into the crash.
Photos of Sennas helmet, blood and hole etc where on the net during the trial, and pictures of his cockpit too.

[Brent]

Well, something hit that steering wheel, and i don't think it was his arm/hand. Sad photo.

[Brent]

Photos of Sennas helmet, blood and hole etc where on the net during the trial, and pictures of his cockpit too.

Sad.

[Manson]

Originally posted by BARnone
I have read that he had a skull fracture running from the front of the head to the back. No article I have read said he DIDN'T have facial injuries.

The first press conference they had after the accident, Dr. Bohanan stated clearly that there were no facial injuries and that the open-faced helmet played no part. Now they are backtracking, hence the suspiscion.

[BARnone]

He hit a cement wall doing 180/mph. Just because it didn't "look" that bad on TV, doesn't mean it wasn't a horrific accident, made possible by the same mind set that brings violence in other sports into our living rooms. Racing, no matter what the suits say is best seen in person. Anyone who has been to an auto race, whether it's rally, NASCAR, CART or F1 will tell you that it is best viewed in person - the sounds, the smells, the people, the whole experience. TV is a lame second to the real experience. The suits will go on modifying these sports more and more for television viewing and in a few years they will be unrecognizable. If a few drivers, marshalls and spectators die in the effort - big deal.

Rest in peace Mr. Earnhardt.

Thanks.

Barnone.

[Snow1]

A friend of mine watched a special on auto accidents and told me that when we crash, we essentially crash three times. One when we our vehicle hits the object, one when our body slams into the steering wheel or dashboard, and one when our brain and internal organs slams into the our skull and cavity walls they're held in. The car's deceleration was immense, he had an open-faced helmet, a possible broken seat belt, and he slammed into a concrete wall. I didn't want to look at the picture. I knew it would make me too emotional.

[Reg]

It's rather disturbing to hear so much talk about NASCAR here, and even more so because of why. I did'nt look at the link, and do not want to start any trouble. Just stating a fact, and think its sad that a death in motorsport happens in general ,and seemingly in this case because of a failed seatbelt?

Death becomes a spectacle for both fans and non fans alike.

[aross]

Just a point about "not looking that bad." To the uneducated race viewer, there is always amazement when a driver walks away from an accident that has seen a car disintegrate with wheels and other bits flying off as it slides luridly down the track. The truly educated race fan knows that this means the crash disipated energy over a long time (relatively). Conversely, it's the accidents that go BANG! and the car stops that are always the most concerning.
Race car drivers know this, too, which is why D.W. was so concerned about D.E. immediately, while the other commentators on air were not (at least publicly).

[Keith Steele]

I would bet if you pooled all of the Winston Cup drivers and asked them whose car would you have rather been in, Stewarts or Earnhardts I'd be willing to bet that all of them would say Earnhardts. I didnt miss a Nascar Race from when ESPN began showing them until 1992. I have seen Cars hit harder than Dale's at least 100 times, where the driver walked away. All this talk about disipating energy in the big pile ups is pure bullshit. Nascar's dont have disipating energy resources and some of those guys were t-boned by cars doing 175 mph more than once. Earnhardt was hit by Schrader and then made contact with the wall abeit head on. It was still a very survivable accident, if not one you walk away from. What made it unsurvivable was that the belt broke. He would have died if he were doing 60 mph. That car scrubbed off speed as it went down the track then up the track at had its enertia further hindered by Schrader's car "breaking" its direct contact. Darrel Waltrip was in fear becasue he saw the reaction of Ken Schrader when he walked up to Dale's car and walked away. The fact he didnt climb out. He said he should be ok if you watched the race moments after the crash because he knew it wasnt a bad wreck. It was only after he saw what was going on down there that he became worried. There isnt much to be done about a seatbelt breaking. I lost my favorite sprint car driver who I'd met 20-30 times when I was 10 to a broken seat belt. I find it highly improbable that the Hans device or closed faced helmet would have saved his life. I appologize to all of the Dale fans reading this. Losing your guy sucks in a most horrible way and my heart goes out to you all.

[LB]

Keith did Adam Petty, Kenny Irwin, Neil Bonnett, O.J. MacDuffie, Gonzalo Rodriguez, Roland Ratzenberger and all the others seatbelts all break?

No they didn't, they all crashed in head on collisions. The head on collision with a solid object is the worst accident you can have. Dales car decelerated from 180 down to almost zero in an instant. I too have seen many many accidents where people have survived head on collisions, however I am not god I don't know why these people have been selected.

The disappation of energy is a scientific fact! It has nothing to do with the car at all, think how many spectacular accidents you have seen in Nascar, then think again of the fatal accidents, they don't really corrolate do they.

I am extremely dubious about the whole seatbelt thing. It just seems strange to me that,

a) There was no report of facial injury at the time, and the Doctor stated that wearing of a full face helmet would not have saved Dale. OK there need not be a facial injury visable although that is unlikely if the blood you see is from the facial region.

b) Why would a broken seatbelt in the lap area lead to his face hitting the steering wheel? If the upper torso was restrained then it is unlikely. If not then I will cede this point.

c) Why is it unlikely that a limb could do the damage, If a limb propelled with force can break cinder blocks then it could bend a wheel.

There are more things but I will leave them to later.

In reply to the comments about my earlier post I never said that the drivers concerned did not suffer, all I said was that he was dead before the car flipped. By this I am illustrating that the subsequent flipping did not cause his death it was the initial sudden stop. He would have passed out in the car when his Neck fractured anyway. Dying instantly does not mean you don't suffer.

[BADGER]

"Dales car decelerated from 180 down to almost zero in an instant."

Did you see the crash? He slid along the guardrail for hundreds of feet and slid into the infield a couple hundred feet away. To say that he hit head on is not really accurate. Sure the front of the car hit first, but most of his velocity was moving parrallel to the wall, not towards it. I agree that NASCAR has done a poor job on thier analysis, but I think that there was some sort of problem with the restraint system.

[Reg]

As I said earlier, I did not care to see those pictures.

I did in fact turn a page in todays Toronto Star, and saw them in there not looking for them.

[LB]

Originally posted by BADGER
"Dales car decelerated from 180 down to almost zero in an instant."

Did you see the crash?

Of course I have seen the crash. Dales car impacted the wall at an angle of roughly 45 degrees it was then pushed down the infield by Ken Schrader's car. I did say almost zero there are of course sideways forces in motion too. There is also rebound off the wall, Every action has an equal and opposite reaction! this reaction of hitting the wall was distrubuted a few ways, through the car and the driver, into the wall and back out down the track. the forces involved are huge.

[Brent]

"Dales car decelerated from 180 down to almost zero in an instant."

Nope.

[MailOrderSupplies]

Originally posted by BARnone
He hit a cement wall doing 180/mph.

No I don't think so. The car was doing about 180mph when it began to fishtail down low on the track. By the time it hit the wall it would have lost some momentum and its remaining momentum was split across 2 vectors: straight ahead and left since it was sliding. Who knows what its straight ahead speed into the wall was (I don't think NASCAR use gforce sensors on cars) but it wasn't 180mph. NASCAR have an incentive to exagerate it in order to divert attention from its own failure to mandate all possible safety equipment. And then there's the delicate issue of its star driver wearing an openface helmet and publicly mocking safety concerns.

The upper right quadrant of the steering wheen was hit hard enough to bend it and leave it covered with blood. That suggests the driver was flung forward and to the right. That's what would happen if the car hit the wall and was hit simultaneously on the right side by the other car. It may be that the 2 impacts coming at the same time from different directions created gforce loads that were not survivable even with better equipment. But it's hard to separate Earnhardt's death from his troglodyte opinions about safety.

[LB]

Originally posted by Brent


Nope.

Actually it did! or whatever speed it was travelling at when it hit the wall poss 140 but by the laws of physics it did.

[Keith Steele]

LB no it didnt. Schrader's car took a huge amount of the brunt of what would have been a pretty hard impact, but still with large amounts of speed scrubbed off as he slid sideways and up to the top of the wall. Earnhardt suffered a cracked sternum, 8 cracked ribs and a broken ankle because the seat belt didnt hold at all five points. It isnt as if your body seperates and only gets injured where the one belt came loose. The fact that his body was not cocooned means the weight would have been distributed unevenly and surely for his sternum and face to come and bend the steering wheel meant things were very out of kilter.

As for the Petty, Irwin crashes those cars did take the wall head on and stop for the most part. Gonzalo's crash I had always thought the unlevel terrain was what killed him. Could you point me to a link that says that massive decelration killed him when he hit the tires and bounced over? I am not saying I don't believe you because it would make sense the car hit very hard and then lazily flipped over the wall.

[Ross Stonefeld]

Rodriguez died of a HANS preventable basalar skull fracture caused by neck hyperextension

[LB]

http://orlandosentin.....rts-headlines

for the Gonzalo stuff its near the bottom.

I am going to stop arguing on this thread for a bit, we are not going to agree on this at all.

Hitting the wall and stopping is a reletive term you can hit the wall stop and rebound from that wall. Earnhardts car was pushed down the banking by Schraders and slid down using gravity as well, had the accident happened on the flat in all likelyhood he would have stopped. It is years since I did Physics so I'm not too hot at explaining forces and force vectors. IF the seatbelt broke I'm sure it was just another factor in the incident. I have seen first hand (at a sprintcar race in NZ ) how badly one shoulder strap failing can affect a crash. however that crash was more like stewarts than Earnhardts.

You should read the second article too.
http://orlandosentin.....rts-headlines

Anyway whatever killed him we are hardly likely to bring him back lets all hope for a safe season of racing from now on. I really don't want to get into more of these debates.