[windowlicker]

Originally Posted by windowlicker ↗

The impact is huge, the front of the Ferrari folding in on its self and then the intense fire taking hold. Pedro would certainly have been killed instantly when the car hit the barrier.

Drivers got out to help, and fire marshalls were quickly on the scene but tragically there was no saving Pedro Rodriguez.

There are loads of photo's from a couple of posts on page 47 of Pedro Rodriguez's fatal crash in a German Sportcar event during 1971. These are the first pictures of poor Pedro being dragged from the burnt wreck that I have seen.

In the first photo it appears that the fire suit has held up well, but I think the dark stains on the legs show very bad leg injuries, with a lot of blood loss.

[windowlicker]

Joe Leonard in the 1968 California 200, the first round of the USAC.

[lp199th]

3D anaglyphs:

[windowlicker]

Bentley Warren has a firey crash on lap 9 in his Finley Offy, at the 1971 USAC Rafaela Indy 300 in Argentina, during heat 2.

Bentley raced in the 1970-1975 seasons, with 37 career starts, including the 1971 and 1975 Indy 500. He finished in the top ten fourteen times with his best finish of 4th position in 1970 at Milwaukee.

[windowlicker]

Pino Pica crashes at the Monza F3 race in 1970 during heat two.

Pina raced in single seaters during the late sixties until moving into sportcars during the early seventies.

[lp199th]

Hey tomcat, what is it that you find so shitty in this video clip?
http://vimeo.com/43937144

[windowlicker]

Len Cave wrecks his Mazda 3 MPS at the Bathurst 12 Hour race in 2008. He went off into a gravel trap and flipped, ripping out the engine and front suspension. Len walked away uninjured.

[windowlicker]

Lee Kunzman at the Odessa Speedway 1970, where Kunzman was taking part in a USAC Sprint Car race. During one of the heat events Stub went over the wall, his car bursting into a ball of fire. Unconscious, Kunzman was taken to Kansas City hospital where his injuries were found to be a broken neck, broken arm and severe burns on his arm, upper body and head.

It was five months before he left hospital and he went staight back into racing, winning his on his comeback.

He said in regard's to his injuries,

'I was pretty self conscious at first, because my appearance was changed quite a bit. But I’ve gotten over it. Some people stare, but I think people in general are a lot nicer to you when you look a little screwed up. I've been back seven or eight times for plastic surgery since I left the hospital in October. There’s still more work to be done, but so far they've built me a nose, eyelids and upper lip. The nose is a little larger and offside.'

[The Dark]

Just thought I'd let people who aren't familiar with some of the Indycar crashes that they used to run on a Methanol mix of fuel. Now, it burns at a higher temperature than normal octane gas, the problem is it's an invisible fire - you can see a heat haze, but until a driver rolls about, you have little clue that he's burning up.
The fire can actually be put out with water rather than extinguisher, but it's still scary to see.

I've no doubt the Rick Mears clip where his car catches fire in the Indy pits is available, that's the most well known clip showing the dangers of methanol fires.

Funnily enough as IRL began to run under floodlights, they found an added benefit was they could then see the methanol burning, tended to be a blueish flame, and therefore made the response a little sharper.

Now the cars run on a Ethanol mix, which is more "green" and of course, very popular in Iowa!

[AlvinKarpis]

Tadashi Sakai: 1967 Japan Grand Prix at Fuji Speedway

Non-fatal