Strange and tragic

[tripowerguy]

I just heard about this and thought how sad. At Tulsa a few weeks ago was a husband and wife team who were trying out a new alcohol dragster. She was the driver and he did the tuning. They were well exsperienced, had been running dragsters for years. This new dragster kept doing wheel stands off the line and they would take it back and work on it. She finally got it to come out of the hole good and was off on a good run, at the top end she had a blow over and it came down headed for the starting line. Wide open throttle and her son was in the van at the starting line she hit the van at an est. 200mph and killed them both. The husband stood helpless and watched it happen, talk about nightmares. :cry Roy

[jester]

wow.......Doesn't that make you stop and think...

[JIMS409]

Here is a link to the Howard's SiteHoward Racing Memorial Site (http://shellyhowardracing.com/) :cry

Very sad indeed, a real tragedy! Met Shelly and she was a first class gal and driver. May God rest their souls.

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[tmracing62]

Please excuse me if you think I am being a jerk, but it's never stopped me before when it comes to safety. This is just a reminder about what you already know.

This kind of horrific thing is hard to grasp. It is very painful.

I and a lot of you have seen plenty of accidents, most of which were "freaky". They were so weird that no one imagined the cause ahead of time. But when analyzed, very often it was something simple that caused it and there was something simple that could have prevented it. Rarely was it completely unavoidable with just a little foresight and attention.

"I got about 400 passes on these slicks and one more will be okay." Tire exploded near the stripe, car veered and took out the other driver.

"Gosh, that chute cable didn't look stretched." Chutes failed to open with the lever at full extension, the dragster slammed through the sand, burrowed under the net and tore off the blower. Think for a minute about the guy's head.

"I felt it go soft when I tightened the AN fitting on the trans cooler." Trans fluid sprayed under the tires and the car flipped and rolled and an $80,000 car was completely destroyed.

"Why didn't she just shut it off?" Throttle linkage went over center and there was no way to pull it back.

"He lightened the calipers." And the chutes got tangled and the calipers were found on the track.

You get the point. All of these problems had signals. All were obvious after the fact.

Magnetos and blower motors are not so simple to shut off, but it can be done. At least they can be made so they don't run out non-stop. Very oddly, such necessary devices are not absolutely required. Shelly Howard may have had a heart attack or a stroke or just plain panicked. But a deadman's switch may not have been present. I don't know and am certainly not minimizing or pointing fingers. That would be cold and arrogant.

Whenever there is an airplane mishap, private and commercial, the cause is made public at least to other pilots. But the details of a crash in drag racing are not. With all the contributions to safety that NHRA (for instance) makes, the fact that this accident might have been prevented based on the experience of others that no one described to the benefit of everyone else, is inexcusable. It is a crime if you ask me. Instead, rather than actually providing complete information to racers and builders so they can determine if it applies to their car, the sport is sanitized by this PR form of denial. Don't expect it to change.

I'm not trying spend your money or time, but consider this. The quicker and faster the car, the more you have to trust it. Every time you change something, consider the impossible before you are on the track. Install a positive kill switch and practice using it - deprive that engine of fuel and fire both especially if you are running a blower motor that will go lean and really run out from under you without a way to kill the spark. Put the car on the stands every week and put a wrench on every nut and bolt you can reach. A good design means all of them. I found a loose Heim joint and missing steering nut (not in the same week) and other less severe issues by investing an hour going over the car like this as a part of the weekly maintentence schedule. By the way, the joint and nut were fine the week before. Just don't assume - make sure. Every part needs to be checked and things like tires have to be replaced before they are worn out.

Don't cut corners. There was a car that used angle iron welded to the frame as a motor plate and it passed tech. Don't expect someone else to take care of you or look for a tricky way to save some bucks. You know what's right. It's better to watch until you can afford to do it right. The list is long of things to stay on top of, but excuses don't change things after an accident.

It's not just you on the track. It's the other driver, their car and their family. Yours too. No matter how brave you are, you are responsible if you hurt someone else.

Of all the things you can do to honor these people that died, this is the most important one.

My opinion.