Racing safety and issues involved (1 Viewer)

[Anthony Forrand]

I was wondering, as someone that works on one of the NHRA safety trucks quite often national and divisional level. What do you all think is the most prevalent safety issue today. Now I have my ideas and concerns that I am trying to work on in my division, but I want a little feedback to make things better for the racers. After all they are who I really work for, and they are the reason I am out there in a SFI20 firesuit in 100+ degree weather.

I know that the first thing that will be brought up is the wall issue, but lets dig deeper and consider other things. Is there things that we can work on right now that might make that wall issue a little smaller. What can we do right now? If installation of softwalls were to be accepted, it would still take a while for that to happen, but there are things we can do right now.

Last thing, my normal job is working in an Emergency room in Upland, California. I have seen some pretty bad head injuries in my EMS career, and I have seen what can happen to those that do survive, there is still room for a lot of growth in this research field. I know there are a lot of other things out there that need medical research dollars too, but here is a link to the Brain Injury Association of America's donation page... Donations. They distribute their donations to various research foundations working on improving medical care and rehabilitation of people suffering from major closed brain injuries.

Thanks for reading, and thank you in advance for taking time and putting in your 2 cents, this will help me make things safer for you.

 

[r2]

Anthony
First of all, Thank You for all you do for little more then a sandwich, bag of chips and a few bottles of water... I understand that it is much more than that as far as why you do what you do... Thanks

Are we just talking about head injuries??
Or any and everything to make this sport safer??

 

[Fueler32]

What he is asking is, Does anyone else out there have any Ideas as to what we can do to help prevent injurys like this, Anthony knows what he is talking about, I work along side him at Many Races, What can we do out there, ????

 

[troy boy]

What do you guys that work on the Safety Safari think of the roll bar padding we use now? The old stuff seemed much softer and I thought did a good job of slowing down the impact. The SFI padding we have now is hard as a rock.
I have heard the reasoning behind it was that it is supposed to be able to take multiple impacts in the same area and not squish down letting the helmet come in contact with the roll bar. But how many times in most accidents will the helmet actually be hit in the exact same spot?
I know most helmets are designed to basically take one hit on one spot. The Styrofoam in the helmet compresses slowing down the impact, but it does not rebound to take another hit. (This is why you junk the helmet after any impact.)The idea of course is that the first impact is the big one and the rest will be lesser or in another area.
I’m not an expert in this area but I have always wondered how others closer the action felt. Time for different padding?

 

[troy boy]

More than you want to know on helmets. And protection from head injurys.

Motorcycle Helmet Design, Helmet Standards and Head Protection - Gear Box - Motorcyclist Online

 

[lmhb oyf]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but an injury as experienced recently was a result of the brain still moving forward inside the skull rather than a direct blow to the head.

If that's the case we need to be looking at a way to dissipate that force of energy in order to alleviate the stress put forth on the brain.

I may be totally wrong here but it's just a thought.

 

[XPilot]

It doesn't look to me as though a funny car has the ability to lose as much energy in a crash as a dragster does. Dragsters are designed to break into sections. A funny car may shed the body, but little appears to happen with the chassis to dissipate the energy, other than distortion. Since there is less area to distort, bend, break, etc, more of that energy must be dissipated by other means.

I know very little about how a funny car chassis works compared to a dragster. I understand the principles are similar, but with the motor in the middle of the chassis there are sure to be differences.

 

[Doug in the woods]

I have been reading alot of posts that blame the track barriers for this recent tragic event.
I have been pondering the series of events and can't help to wonder if perhaps a remote shut off device would have prevented Erics death.
I know this may sound like a keyboard crew chief but lets look at the facts as we know them.
car hits wall
car bounces off and crosses track head-on into track barrier in other lane.
a violent vibration incured at some time.
Perhaps some debris was present on track (track was not under NHRA safety crew control) thus puncturing tire (not tire failure) leading to violent vibration causing driver to lose orientation as well as conscionsious.
car accelerates into oposing wall head on under full throttle.
IMO no amount of protection can prevent injury under those conditions.
a remote shut off would have shut car off after first impace with wall.
Sorry if I sound pompus or mr. know it all but reading the reports of events as they happened this is the sceanior I come up with.
install remote kill devices on the cars (chutes deploy as well)
other events that could have been tragic = A Force crossing centerline as well as hitting wall, several cars hitting walls (car bodies have come off and prevented driver from seeing (Ron Capps several years ago when body came off and stayed in front of driver preventing him from seeing where he is going)
this problem is more prevelant in FC due to the car body.
Any time a car shows signs of losing parts have several vaccums clean the track surface. I feel the NHRA safety crew do a fair job but the issue of debris on the track has surfaced too many times.
sorry for the rant but just had to voice my opnion.

 

[Wife's Name]

The remote shut-off switch is a good idea, but look at the logistics of it. By the time the car starts heading to the wall for the first impact, someone, be it a crew member or NHRA official, have to hit a button. The signal then has to go from the button, through a relay of some sorts, to the car itself. Then it has to activate a solenoid (that hopefully isn't damaged on the first hit) to somehow cut the car off, which in a supercharged, nitro-burning application, isn't an easy task. You have to keep in mind, sometimes it is not only the velocity of the impact, but the angle of it.

Also, two other things to keep in mind. First, NASCAR has a button which freezes the field when the yellow flag is thrown, and a few times there have been controversy as to how quick the field was frozen due to human reaction of hitting the button compared to when the flag came out. Second, standing on the starting line, it is extremely difficult to see what happens and what is happening when things go wrong. I know first hand from when my brother crashed his Super Street car a few years ago. All we saw was dust and that was it. At times it can he hard to discriminate between a car spinning the tires, blowing the motor, or going out of control.

In any case, it was a bad deal what happened to Eric, and what NHRA, Goodyear, and the rest of the teams need to do is sit down, anaylize the data from the crash, find out why the tire went down, and come up with a solution to keep something like this from happening again.

Just my two cents.


Frankie Cicerale
Tax Bracket Racing
Piscataway, NJ
S/C 151J
S/G 151J
S/ST 151J
Stock 1510
www.taxbracketracing.com

 

[none]

Once again, you don't have all the facts.

The wall was not the problem

The car was not accelerating when it hit the wall

The car only hit the right wall

Eric did get the chutes out, and on time.

I understand that everyone wants to speculate and try to come up with an answer, but without all the facts, it's tough to come to the right conclusions

I'm sorry that I can't say more, but PLEASE wait until all is investigated before making your detirminations.

Alan

 

[Wife's Name]

Alan,

Sorry for the misinformation. I have edited and changed my post accordingly.

Surely everything that can be looked at will be, and us in the racing community can be sure that whatever needs to be changed will be changed by all parties involved. Sad to say, but that is the only GOOD thing to come out of this horrific tragedy.

Frankie Cicerale
Tax Bracket Racing
Piscataway, NJ
S/C 151J
S/G 151J
S/ST 151J
Stock 1510
www.taxbracketracing.com

 

[none]

Anthony started a great thread, I'm sure some of you have general safety ideas that could be discussed.

Alan

 

[yoda]

Anthony... What are the major issues involved with on track incidents?

Fire

Impact

I can't think of too many other things that would be considered issues, and Safety Safari has got a great handle on it, with great firefighting, extrication and medical stabilization techniques- we can't thank you guys enough.

Just short of putting test monkeys in for every pass, I can't see the sport being 100% safe, and I'm glad to see the leaps and bounds that safety has taken over the decades- A LOT less fires (alot of that due to better crewchiefs and engineeers on the teams), and when there is an impact incident, more drivers truly walk away than ever before.

My only suggestion would be the addition of 200 pounds to all 4 wheeled classes minimum weights across the board. Cars would slow down for a while, and the addition of safety features such as driver pods could be investigated without the performance disadvantage that some teams would incur by implementing that feature and being above the minimum weight because of it.

Just my opinion

 

[r2]

I really have to wonder if we have seen the opening of a different can of worms with the head and neck restraint system... I am sure that anyone who has seen the tests of said devices, will not argue one bit about the test results or their benefit vs. not wearing one... However, has this created another unforeseen issue??

Anyone who has ever put a helmet on and banged their head with their fist or hands, knows about the headache you have for quite a while... There has to be a better way of distributing that force, of any type, with the helmet having an impact with anything...

Bill Simpson is the man... I have no doubt that he has or is testing just about every material known to man... Having said that, I have always felt that the styrofoam insert, while very effective, is simply to dense of a material...
Maybe a gel, silicone, water, air, different type of foam, etc. should be, if not already, has been looked into as far as a liner goes...

I know that my thoughts are just that...
But two minds working together are always better then one vision... Sorry if I am off base or out of line with my thought process... Just talking about your everyday helmet design, not a single incident... No two for the most part, are ever the same...

 

[mick]

airbags for race cars?

 

[Ken]

First off, I think that the Safety Safari folks do a fantastic job! They are extremely professional and effective when things go bad. I would'nt trade them for any other safety team out there. Nothing here should be considered a criticism of these fine people or their abilities.

I'd like to see NHRA take the team to the next level with a full time medical team. It would consist of a physcian with experience in trauma emergencies, assisted by paramedics and/or nurses with similar experience in trauma care. Purchase or have a sponsoring company provide an ambulance specially equipped to handle the type of injuries that result from racing accidents. I think that this would allow for two important things.

1) Specialized treatment to begin as soon as possible. In many injuries, being able to begin treatment immediately can lessen the severity of the injury in the long run. Even with helicopters being at every event, precious minutes can be saved.

2) Give the racers an additional "piece of mind". Having the same emergency medical people at every race would give the racers and their families a little more confidence in knowing that they will be receiving the best care possible by the best prepared people - people that they know by name and trust.

If the NHRA is open to looking at this idea, I could hook them up with some of my contacts in the emergency vehicle industry. Just PM me and I'll get back to you.

 

[yoda]

airbags for race cars?

already discussed.. Sensors not fast enough...too much viabration- could send a false trigger... not really designed for +50 negative G's....

 

[Terry]

I really have to wonder if we have seen the opening of a different can of worms with the head and neck restraint system... I am sure that anyone who has seen the tests of said devices, will not argue one bit about the test results or their benefit vs. not wearing one... However, has this created another unforeseen issue??

Anyone who has ever put a helmet on and banged their head with their fist or hands, knows about the headache you have for quite a while... There has to be a better way of distributing that force, of any type, with the helmet having an impact with anything...

Bill Simpson is the man... I have no doubt that he has or is testing just about every material known to man... Having said that, I have always felt that the styrofoam insert, while very effective, is simply to dense of a material...
Maybe a gel, silicone, water, air, different type of foam, etc. should be, if not already, has been looked into as far as a liner goes...

I know that my thoughts are just that...
But two minds working together are always better then one vision... Sorry if I am off base or out of line with my thought process... Just talking about your everyday helmet design, not a single incident... No two for the most part, are ever the same...

Ray, that's a really interesting thought. Many football helmets have gel, liquid or air liners in them. I certainly don't profess to be a helmet expert, but you hit on a topic that I have always wondered about, having a son who was both a motocrosser and a football player, I was always puzzled about the dissimilarities of helmet suspension design between the two areas. I'm sure there is a simple explanation for it, and hopefully someone on the board can fill me in, but you have a really good thought. Does Bill Simpson frequent the board at all? He certainly could give us the answers.

 

[stinky]

I have always wondered if instead of a remote kill switch or something of that nature like monster trucks use... if it would work to put a lever on the steering wheel like what they use on lawn mowers for engaging and disengaging the cutting blade. Most drivers that I have seen with "in cockpit" cameras always seem to keep on hand as a dedicated steering hand and the other runs the fuel levers, parachutes and any other necessary switches. It should be something that must be held on for the motor to run instead of a switch to turn shut it off. We use foot and hand switches at work to do this, so that way when you run away from a machine that is freaking out... you don't have to think about stopping the machine before you get out of the way. Cause when I panic... thinking is the last thing I'm thinking of

If something like this was added it could deploy chutes, pneumatically apply the brakes, shut of fuel pumps and electrical, if the driver isn't capable of doing it, all at the same time quicker than a remote device.

 

[troy boy]

Ray, that's a really interesting thought. Many football helmets have gel, liquid or air liners in them. I certainly don't profess to be a helmet expert, but you hit on a topic that I have always wondered about, having a son who was both a motocrosser and a football player, I was always puzzled about the dissimilarities of helmet suspension design between the two areas. I'm sure there is a simple explanation for it, and hopefully someone on the board can fill me in, but you have a really good thought. Does Bill Simpson frequent the board at all? He certainly could give us the answers.

Ray,Terry,
Did you have a chance to look at the link I put up on helmets? It goes in pretty deep looking at two different schools of thought on head protection. Kinda hard vs soft.

Also as the original idea of this thread was for any safety ideas and not to be a guess of how we could have saved Eric I hope I didnt turn it in that direction its just a question I have had for a few years on roll bar padding and if it could be made better.
Also not all blows to the head are fatal. Rance McDaniel and Jerry Stiner both had bad crashes and got their bell rung pretty good. Much recoup time and Im not sure they are at 100% yet. So I think more could be done in this area. Just my .02