accidents

[Raglanparade]

Having been born in 1984 and not following motor racing until the mid-90's..... one of my first memories was sennas shunt at imola.. i was just wondering what are some of the other serious motor racing accidents that i should know about. so far i have read about:

-Gilles Villeneuve
-Jim Clark

I play the game grand prix legends and i heard a lot of the drivers out of that game died to motor racing but i dont really know how it happened if you get me.

What are some of the defining accidents of motor racing?

-jason

[simon drabble]

unless I have missed the point of this thread I think its a pretty sick obsession that you have

[TimD]

To be honest, I'd rather be celebrating the fact that we don't have the sorts of losses that were such a sad part of previous years.

I think rather than develop a discussion here, I would recommend a thread in another forum which has sought to chronicle all those who lost their lives competing, and has done so unsensationally and reverently.

http://forums.atlasf1.com/showthread...&threadid=9705

[D-Type]

i don't think the poster is being ghoulish. I think he is genuinely interested in an aspect of racing that the tables of statistics and potted race accounts don't cover (although there have been books that do). Mercifully things have improved since the fifties when we would lose two or three top drivers each year. Since then cars and circuits have been progressively improved.

On the above basis I am interpreting his question to mean 'significant' or 'influential' accidents rather than simply fatal accidents. There are countless instances of major or fatal accidents leading to changes in the regulations. T

The three below are among the most well known.

At Le Mans 1955 Pierre 'Levegh' in a Mercedes left the track and went into the crowd with numerous fatalities. This led a series of improvements to circuits in the interest of spectator safety. And to a ban on racing in Switzerland which is still in force.

The fatal accident to de Portago in the 1957 Mille Miglia, also killing several spectators, triggered the demise of the Mille Miglia and other long distance races. This would probably have happened anyway as the number of cars on the roads increased.

The non-fatal accident that Jackie Stewart had at Spa in 1966(?) led to his crusade to improve driver safety and to Louis Stanley setting up the Grand Prix Medical Unit which in turn led to improved medical facilities at all circuits.

[John Turner]

If this is a serious study, may I suggest you read 'Echoes of Imola' by David Tremayne published by MRP in 1996, 'Life at the Limit' by Professor Sid Watkins' published by Macmillan, also in 1996, and 'Beyond the Limit' also by Professor Sid Watkins, published by Macmillans in 2001. An effective trilogy really, covering events before and after Imola 1994 and the measures taken to imnprove safety and minmise the risk of further tragedies over the ensuing years.

As D type has said, you also need to learn about the great work by Jackie Stewart, in the 60's/70's, and that of Louis Stanley alluded to in Damien Smith's 'Soapbox' piece in last week's (29/1) issue of Autosport.

[Redlake27]

I saw one of the Havoc programmes on Men and Motors yesterday. It had some great footage of harmless spills from the mid 80s Group C era.

It was only when it showed a horrendous shunt at Eau Rouge with a Porsche 962 damaged beyond recognition that I realised I had been watching the accident that saw Stefan Bellof lose his life. The voiceover commentator did not even mention this fact, but judging by his other comments, neither him or the scriptwriter had much knowledge of motorsport. I was rather shocked at how badly this was handled by the producers of the video.

[John Turner]

Redlake27, agreed, I noted that too. Appalling.

[Andrew Kitson]

One of the havoc videos also has footage of Herbert's horrendous F3000 shunt, yet claimed that no-one was seriously hurt in the footage on the video. That crash left Johnny with pretty serious injuries I think we all agree. Not nice.

[GolddustMini]

those havoc "best crashes" usually just find the shunts in the archieves and dont bother to research them at all.


i think this thread is not particularly nice, there are many accidents that have taken place that really dont need telling like a game of chilish chinese whispers


ok most of us enjoy seeing crashes, a simple spin or a few cars tangling and going off into the gravel etc, part of the fun, as soon as someone is hurt etc it becomes no form of entertainment, for example when burti (if thats the right person) crashed at spa a few years ago the fact that the camera men continued to show the accident again and again after wards and kept poking the camera at the car as they were trying to remove him from the car was just damnright disgraceful