23 replies to this topic

[SKL]

Surprised I'd missed this yesterday...    Captain "Nice" succumbed to his injuries from the practice crash two days earlier during the Austrian GP weekend.  

 

Felt like I'd lost a member of the family-  was lucky enough to have met him and talked with him several times over the years.

 

Had David sign my copy of "Unfair Advantage" several years ago when he was racing the Brumos car.

 

Imagine what he could have accomplished with Rick Mears.    God I'm getting old...  (I was a first year resident at the U of IA hospitals in Iowa City when I got the news...)

[Ray Bell]

What I recall of this death was the surprise of it all...

 

There must have been a lot of confidence that he wouldn't succumb.

[Nemo1965]

What I recall of this death was the surprise of it all...

 

There must have been a lot of confidence that he wouldn't succumb.

Regarding that, I can't say that I remember it, because I followed F1 but was quite young... but afterwards I have read that Mark was conscious, talked freely and did not seem hurt at all. But, as we all know, he got a headache, that got worse and worse and then succumbed to a bleeding in his brains in the hospital. 

 

So yeah, the general idea was that Mark would be fine. But then again, the same was thought of Ronnie Peterson after Monza, in first instance. Now I write that down, I remember in first instance at Monza, the greatest worry was about Brambilla. Why? Because a pole had struck his head, just like with Donohue...

[2F-001]

I remember being both shocked and upset by the unexpected outcome.

At the time, I think it added to the growing awareness of the complex prognoses for head injuries - even relatively "minor" ones. Not just in motorsport.

 

(And then there were the liability claims that ensued against, er, Goodyear and Bell, wasn't it?)

 

Some years later, the danger of such injuries came into the public spotlight again (in the UK) when an English Actress (Natasha, of the Richardson thespian dynasty) died sometime after a seemingly minor skiing injury. No direct racing connection here except that both her and Mark suffered (albeit different) types of brain bleed and their conditions followed a similar course post accident. Oh, and Richardson's skiing incident occurred at Mont Tremblant. 

Edited by 2F-001, 21 August 2020 - 11:41.

[Dipster]

Prior to retirement First Aid (preparing to deal with major incidents) was quite a big part of my job. Head injuries of any type are now (indeed have been for many years) taken seriously and patients should be kept under careful observation until safely in the hands of a hospital and the information passed on. Even if they protest that they are fine..... They simply might not be. 

[Collombin]

No direct racing connection here

An indirect one - her grandmother played Scott Stoddard's mother.

[2F-001]

Gosh - hadn't realised that!

Edited by 2F-001, 21 August 2020 - 12:01.

[Dick Dastardly]

Prior to retirement First Aid (preparing to deal with major incidents) was quite a big part of my job. Head injuries of any type are now (indeed have been for many years) taken seriously and patients should be kept under careful observation until safely in the hands of a hospital and the information passed on. Even if they protest that they are fine..... They simply might not be.

I count myself very lucky to still be here after slipping on ice early 2014 and banging my head on the ice. Very painful, seeing stars, don't remember the fall or the minutes leading up to it...just remember being helped up, given lots of pain killers then taken to my doctor, who diagnosed a subdural haematota and sent me to Carlisle Hospital for an MRI scan, which set alarm bells ringing, massive blood clot on my brain. So a blues and twos ambulance ride across to Newcastle RVI [cue cartoon of ambulance all lights going, with patient laid out in back reading pacenotes to the driver ] arriving teatime-ish Fri. Told I'd be operated on that eve...but got to around 23.00 hours, when consultant came and told me they'd operate just after midnight [they had a more urgent case, hence the delay]. Me thinking I go to sleep...normal sleep and anaesthetic sleep...when I wake up I should be fine. Remember being wheeled into the theatre and being introduced to the various personnel there.....then waking up back in the ward early hours Sat, feeling fine and ready to go home. A few painkillers then didn't need any more as head was fine....only thing that stopped me from being discharged Mon am [48+ hours after op] was my temp was a bit higher than they'd liked, due to not having the paracetamol when they handed them out [which helps to cool you] and not drinking enough water. Once, I'd been told that, I drank plenty etc, was discharged on the Tues.....and have had no ill effects since. They didn't even try to stop me driving temporarily, was back behind the wheel on the Wed. It feels surreal to have survived such an experience. I now have a lightweight skull due to burr holes being drilled into it to relieve the pressure on the brain. Had to go to doctors a week / 10 days later to have the clips removed .... .... .....

[2F-001]

At the risk of being flippant, Dick... do you have blanking grommets in the holes?

If you had threaded inserts installed, a whole range of interesting bolt on accessories could be possible!

 

Did you notice your lowered centre of gravity?

 

(Apologies for a rather irreverent post in the context of this thread.)

Edited by 2F-001, 21 August 2020 - 16:16.

[Dick Dastardly]

No idea what was used to plug the holes   Probably have to get my hospital discharge letter and see if it says, though I probably wouldn't understand the terminology / phrases used

But my skull has quite obvious indentations etc....anyone attempting phrenology ?...the art of determining a person's intelligence / personality?...on me would have a field day  

I still have a bump from the fall at the back of my head, fortunately it is benign and no danger..

[SKL]

Mark had what is called an epidural hematoma which at first may be almost asymptomatic but then turns into something VERY serious VERY quickly.  A subdural hematoma can be chronic and while concerning usually isn't a major emergency.

CT scanners were in their infancy at that time.  I assume the hospital Roger got him to had one.  Otherwise they were hard to diagnose with angiograms.  If they had diagnosed an epidural right off the bat he probably could have been saved...

[Nemo1965]

By the way: I wrote that after the starting crash at Monza 1978, Vittorio Brambilla was hit in the head by a pole... but he was hit by a wheel. Not important, but the urgency and worry that surrounded his accident vis-a-vis the fiery accident of Peterson, can be explained because of Donohue's death three years earlier, I think... 

[doc knutsen]

Mark had what is called an epidural hematoma which at first may be almost asymptomatic but then turns into something VERY serious VERY quickly.  A subdural hematoma can be chronic and while concerning usually isn't a major emergency.

CT scanners were in their infancy at that time.  I assume the hospital Roger got him to had one.  Otherwise they were hard to diagnose with angiograms.  If they had diagnosed an epidural right off the bat he probably could have been saved...

At the time of Donohue's accident,I was about to start my final year of medical school, and learnt of the accident while visiting the in-laws in Virginia, US of A during the summer break. We certainly did not have access to CT scanners at my training hospitals at that time, never mind MR which is now used in head injury evaluations. Mark's injury was a critical one, like you say, in that an epidural haematoma develops very quickly into a life-threatening condition, whereas a subdural haematoma usually is nowhere near as acute. My wife slipped on ice and hit the back of her head on icy ground early in 2019, and was only diagnosed with a subdural haematoma after she gradually developed neurologcal symptomes related to the right-side extremities, some six weeks after the injury. The haematoma was demonstrated to measure some 90x30x20mms but it had developed very slowly, thus not giving any alarming symptoms for some considerable time.

Many of our heroes would have been saved, given the diagnostic measures available to-day. For some reason this set me thinking about poor Ivor Bueb, who lived for some days after an F2 accident, but succumbed to a ruptured spleen which I understand was undiagnosed. If only...but then, if there had been Armco and sand traps at Hockenheim in 1968...

Edited by doc knutsen, 22 August 2020 - 10:02.

[E1pix]

I count myself very lucky to still be here after slipping on ice early 2014 and banging my head on the ice. Very painful, seeing stars, don't remember the fall or the minutes leading up to it...just remember being helped up, given lots of pain killers then taken to my doctor, who diagnosed a subdural haematota and sent me to Carlisle Hospital for an MRI scan, which set alarm bells ringing, massive blood clot on my brain. So a blues and twos ambulance ride across to Newcastle RVI [cue cartoon of ambulance all lights going, with patient laid out in back reading pacenotes to the driver ] arriving teatime-ish Fri. Told I'd be operated on that eve...but got to around 23.00 hours, when consultant came and told me they'd operate just after midnight [they had a more urgent case, hence the delay]. Me thinking I go to sleep...normal sleep and anaesthetic sleep...when I wake up I should be fine. Remember being wheeled into the theatre and being introduced to the various personnel there.....then waking up back in the ward early hours Sat, feeling fine and ready to go home. A few painkillers then didn't need any more as head was fine....only thing that stopped me from being discharged Mon am [48+ hours after op] was my temp was a bit higher than they'd liked, due to not having the paracetamol when they handed them out [which helps to cool you] and not drinking enough water. Once, I'd been told that, I drank plenty etc, was discharged on the Tues.....and have had no ill effects since. They didn't even try to stop me driving temporarily, was back behind the wheel on the Wed. It feels surreal to have survived such an experience. I now have a lightweight skull due to burr holes being drilled into it to relieve the pressure on the brain. Had to go to doctors a week / 10 days later to have the clips removed .... .... .....

Thanks for sharing this... and count having healthcare as a blessing.

Here in the US, it’s all about some getting wealthier while making others poor. I suspect we’re finally about to see “government-funded healthcare” to bail out for-profit medical businesses after COVID — but no one will complain.

[Bob Riebe]

When I read it was 45 years ago, while I do not pin deaths in my memory, just that phrase made me remember it was summer 50 years ago that Jerry Titus crashed his Pontiac in front me at the Trans-Am and died later that summer.

 

It is odd some times how just reading some thing like that suddenly pops out a memory not thought of for decades.

Edited by Bob Riebe, 25 August 2020 - 20:04.

[E1pix]

Jerry hit the 13 abutment, right?

I was there, too, but at 3... I think.

[Bob Riebe]

Jerry hit the 13 abutment, right?

I was there, too, but at 3... I think.

Base of the Billy Mitchel bridge.

[Catalina Park]

...but then, if there had been Armco and sand traps at Hockenheim in 1968...

Bert Hawthorne was killed by that Armco in 1972.

[doc knutsen]

Bert Hawthorne was killed by that Armco in 1972.

I seem to remember that his car went in between two layers of guard rail, so that he was decapitated. I think it is unlikely that he would have been better off if he had hit the trees that Clark did. But properly installed and supported guard rail should not open up like it did in some cases in the Seventies.

[Doug Nye]

I saw - from a distance, thankfully - the aftermath of Helmut Koinigg's fatal Armco encounter at The Glen in 1974, one year after Cevert's there in the Tyrrell. Very, very nasty incidents - indeed...

 

In Mark's case I was told he might have survived had not the casevac helicopter climbed so high to clear the mountains en route to the hospital. The assumption or allegation was that the lower pressure at altitude exacerbated the bleed he was suffering.  

 

DCN

[E1pix]

A friend’s dad was working that corner In ‘73. :-(

Being a lifetime climber and trekker, the altitude theory seems right on the mark — and quite similar to the inverse; edema forcing quick descents to lower altitude.

(Seems you’ve posted being your being a mountaineering fan, too Doug, hence the reference)

[SKL]

I was supposed to be at the Watkins Glen race in '73, going with a good friend from Iowa.  Couldn't get the weekend off (med school didn't think it was THAT important!) but in a way I'm glad I didn't.  My friend however did take a lot of pictures-  I'll have to see if I can find them because that was a special time in F1...  I do remember great shots of Denny and Emmo in the Mac's.

[MartLgn]

By the way: I wrote that after the starting crash at Monza 1978, Vittorio Brambilla was hit in the head by a pole... but he was hit by a wheel. Not important, but the urgency and worry that surrounded his accident vis-a-vis the fiery accident of Peterson, can be explained because of Donohue's death three years earlier, I think... 

In one of the more widely used images of the Monza crash poor Brambilla can be seen in his car, head slumped to one side with nobody in attendance whilst Peterson had been dragged from the car and the fire extinguished! The immediate outcome for Ronnie would obviously had been different if he'd been left in the blazing Lotus.

[SKL]

It is unfortunate that it is too easy to Monday morning quarterback  these tragedies-   Mark's epidural hematoma and Ronnie's fat embolism seem so preventable today...   and even though I'm not a big fan of the aeroscreen Justin would still be with us if we'd had it at Pocono...