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A serious No Prep Accident. (1 Viewer)

Huge said:
This is so sad and gives drag racing such a black eye. I was afraid something like this would eventually happen.:(
www.yahoo.com

Two children dead in Texas drag racing crash

The track competition was part of the "Airport Race Wars 2" event and was being held at an airport in Texas.
www.yahoo.com www.yahoo.com
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You are right Eugene. Very sad. But this didn't happen at a sanctioned track with all of the safety that comes with that. I would think that running unpredictable cars at a facility like this is risky. But the uninformed public and media may indeed paint this event with the same brush as official sanctioned events, like you say giving our beloved sport an undeserved black eye.
 
i dont understand, since the race was held on an air strip, I'm assuming there are no guardrails/walls, unless they constructed some temporary ones. If there were no containment structures, how is it possible to allow spectators on the flanks of the track?
 
camaro said:
i dont understand, since the race was held on an air strip, I'm assuming there are no guardrails/walls, unless they constructed some temporary ones. If there were no containment structures, how is it possible to allow spectators on the flanks of the track?
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the article I read said there were barriers to the finish line then none after that.
 
Today on ABC Radio news it was reported that it was on a Airport Runway with only temporary spectator protection to the finish line.
And that it was NOT on a dragstrip.
 
Unaware of this incident I was just talking with my son about this kind of danger last night after seeing a few minutes of No Prep Kings with hundreds of people lining the burnout box and behind the starting line. Apparently these folks have not been around race cars long enough to realize you can be killed by an exploding trans, blower, driveshaft or errant car. It was one of the first things I learned about being around drag cars....things go wrong; stuff breaks at high rpm, like in the water box or at the line, so stay out of the line of fire of rotating parts, and out of the direction of travel of a car under power. Duh!

NHRA should sieze this opportunity to call out No-prep and Street Outlaws and tell the world THIS is why we have legal drag racing with safety rules and precautions in place. They don't need to worry about alienating any of the fans of that kind of racing because most of them would never go to a big show race anyhow. But it would be a smart PR move for legitimate racing to disassociate themselves from these clowns.

Sorry to rant, but this kind of thing is just senseless.
 
Back in the 1970’s I promoted drag races and at some of the larger events, we had people doing what we know now are really dumb and dangerous things. I’m not proud of the way I allowed it to happen to compete the race program. But I was fortunate at the time and it’s by the grace of God that nobody was hurt. That was about 50 years ago, and all drag race promotions should have improved since then.

It’s obvious that the typically fine people of the Kerrville Convention and Visitors Bureau didn’t plan for something like this happening. It’s also obvious that they will pay for it for decades with some of them possibly going to jail over it.

Unfortunately, most of the blame will most likely be fully placed on the driver and not the inept promotion group who should never have allowed the starter to start a race with unprotected people past the finish line. The driver may end up with some blame in this, but the question from the Police Investigator should be:

Did you inspect the track before your run and when did you know there would be
people beyond the finish line that were not protected by a safety barrier?

Fourteen years ago, after the 2007 drag race demonstration disaster in Tennessee, NHRA should have developed a logical “NHRA Temporary Track and Event Guide” for groups just like the Kerrville Conv. & Visitors Bureau. It would be in NHRA’s benefit for organizations to be able to hold safe events that improve public opinion of drag racing rather than give ALL of drag racing the black eye it’s receiving today.

Organizations who promote drag racing on temporary tracks need an easy to obtain and very serious “Minimum Safety Standards Guide” written by people who “have been there” and know what can go wrong. This disaster could have easily been averted in Kerrville by simply not starting any race when people were in an unsafe area.

This guide could also demand minimum education and safety requirements for track officials, drivers, safety crew, etc. While I’m sure the NHRA’s legal team would rather hide from any potential liability, they must also know this would help NHRA’s image and prestige while helping to increase drag racing awareness in a very positive light. Good lawyers must know there are ways to provide this public service while protecting NHRA from law suits and liability. A proper NHRA Temporary Track and Event Guide would also allow NHRA to point blame on any promoter group who ignores them and has avoidable injuries. This would reduce/eliminate NHRA and drag racing’s black eye from other's public disasters.
 
It looks like there is a drag strip 30 minutes from down town San Antonio. Why not run your no prep event there? I understand airports if there is nothing around (Long Island) but there is a track right in the vicinity! Condolences to the families who lost loved ones.
 
James said:
It looks like there is a drag strip 30 minutes from down town San Antonio. Why not run your no prep event there? I understand airports if there is nothing around (Long Island) but there is a track right in the vicinity! Condolences to the families who lost loved ones.
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The Kerrville Conv. & Visitor's Bureau sole reason for existence is to increase spending in the Kerrville area, not the San Antonio area. The KC&V would never have promoted a drag race at the San Antonio track or they would have all been fired.

The KC&V apparently had drawn a crowd larger than they planned for as at most drag races the spectators crowd the startling line area and are only past the finish when it's an overflow crowd. Had they known the danger or respected the danger, they wouldn't have let anyone be past the 1000' mark. That's my point in calling for NHRA to develop a guide for events like this. IF done safely, they improve the image of drag racing. This one didn't.
 
Like spectators were never killed at sanctioned drag strips.... I can think of at least four instances. Including NHRA national event.
 
Nick Name said:
Like spectators were never killed at sanctioned drag strips.... I can think of at least four instances. Including NHRA national event.
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No one said there were never any spectators killed at sanctioned drag strips. It is impossible to 100% guarantee a tragedy won't happen at any racing event. Every time there was a serious accident at NHRA they have tried to learn from it so that it doesn't happen again. When the tragic accident happened at Phoenix when the wheel came off there was a whole new hub designed for top fuel and funny cars. But that tragedy was from a parts failure anyway not from careless stupidity like this tragedy was from. I don't know what your point is... but my point is that these no prep events need to take more precautions or it isn't going to be good for anyone in the future.
 
Last edited:
I had mis-posted under the Dylan accident
Nobody wants to create a liability - even if it claims lives:

A tragedy in so many ways.....
This will not be helpful for those community people who might try to set up programs to get kids racing off-the-streets.
There are so many situations where innovative communities could set up 1/8 mile supervised street race situations. Now - in spite of the fact that people are killed every weekend because of illegal street racing, the easy pushback will be "we can't create a liability"
 
TSK said:
If NHRA was to make up a list of rules for Kerrville type events, they will become liable for accidents such as what happened there.
And, given how litigious this country has become, I don’t blame NHRA for keeping away from such events.
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That’s where we will have to disagree. NHRA is already at risk every time they hold a National Event or are associated with any other drag racing event. But NHRA has been doing this for 70 years due to their ability to dissolve themselves from liability for injury or deaths at their events.

NHRA developing a “Temporary Track and Event Minimum Safety Guide for Drag Racing” would be in NHRA’s long term interest as it would show their concern for safety at any “drag racing” event and protect their vested interest in protecting the image of drag racing of any kind. NHRA needs to constantly condemn illegal street racing while helping smaller events like the Kerrville C&VB’s event go off safely and increase the public awareness of the fun a properly run drag racing event can provide.

While I’m not a lawyer and don’t pretend to know how the legal wording should be. NHRA has lawyers for that. My guess would be that NHRA could easily post many times in the guide that “NHRA is NOT responsible and/or liable for anything that happens at any and all drag racing events not fully sanctioned by NHRA at a purpose built and currently NHRA approved drag strip conducted in accordance to their written guidelines.

NHRA’s lawyers would have the ability to assure that many disclaimers and other legal methods of eliminating any liability to NHRA were in the guide. That would most assuredly include an “Errors and Omissions” clause of some type to protect them from racers and attendee’s ability to develop new ways to hurt or kill themselves and others.

If NHRA cannot protect itself from harm, they need to quit sanctioning drag races and drag strips as there are deaths and major injuries that occur at NHRA tracks practically every year.
 
It's one thing to hold a racing event at a purpose-built facility. You've got tech inspectors, a well trained safety team, guard walls and, generally, a smooth, well groomed racing surface.
It's a whole other matter to hold an event at a location built for something other than racing.
An airport's surface is usually anything but completely smooth. You can't put guard walls on an active air field, hence the temporary water filled barriers at the event where this tragedy occurred.
Besides, those disclaimers in fine print aren't worth the ink used to print them.
If NHRA is going to put their stamp on any event there is no reason for them to race anywhere but at a sanctioned track.
 
in this lawyer happy world I'd be reluctant to put any guidelines out for general use with NHRA on it. They could post minimum guidelines for NHRA sanctioned tracks and if someone else wants to follow it they are on their own. You would think any insurer of an event like they had in Kerrville would want some minimum safety standards. I sure hope they had good insurance.
 
Check out Immokalee Drag Strip that's been running on an airport runway for the last 20 years. https://www.immraceway.com/ They do have concrete k barriers that were put in place with a forklift.
There's always a reason something won't work. But if Wally Parks had listened to the folks in Southern California who bad mouthed all those black jacketed and greasy drag racers in 1950, there would be no NHRA. And there would have been many more street racing deaths than there have been.
My suggestion wasn't for assisting temporary tracks to race Pro Stocks, Top Fuel or even 8 second bracket cars. Most of these events are for ways to get kids off the streets in their street legal cars.
Yes, the new cars like the Tesla Plaid are making this harder, but it's the high school aged kids in 13 seconds and slower cars that cause most of the street racing damage. I remember it all too well... Back in the 60's, I was one of those kids. My last street race was in 1965 against my best friend and he almost took out the side of County Speed Shop in St. L. when a little old lady in a Rambler pulled out of a side street just when we were both banging 3rd gear. Even after that, it was only because we had Alton Dragway and MAR close to us did we stop street racing.
The people who are trying to help stop street racing by putting on these events are not the bad guys. They are trying to stop typical kids from racing where your family is driving. Without someone's help, they will continue to do things wrong and hurt people. Or they will be forced to give up and street racing will continue in your neighborhood.
NHRA can hide from the problem and just make sure their not liable for any harm, but the image of drag racing will never improve or become main stream.
Wally Parks original idea was to send the NHRA Safety Safari on the road to preach the gospel of quarter-mile speed and safety. (It was a good one at the time, but with today's automotive technology, maybe 1/8th mile racing would be a lot smarter.)
 
Here is the promo video for Race Wars 2. It has highlights from what I assume was the first event, Race Wars 1. No barriers at all on the track in this video. So the temporary water filled barriers they brought in was actually an improvement. Scary stuff. Feel terrible for the family. I wonder if the barriers were brought in because someone lost control in the first event?🤔

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=388595799594712
 
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