Le Mans Series: Earnhardt: Fire

[GettinHeadStuds]

I was watching when this happend. Freggin' scarier than piss. The inboard camera shot was....raw...was like a Hollywood stunt but real. Thank goodness he'll be ok. Hope he returns to the Le Mans series.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/nm/20040718/us_nm/nascar_earnhardt_dc_1

[techweenie]

I watched it. Amazing. Looked like the bad old days before fuel cells.

Sure glad he got off with minor burns!

[pwd72s]

What frightened me was the crew chief interview...where he said that the latest fuel, containing alcohol, degraded the foam in fuel cells. Thus, they had changed to a new fuel cell before the race. Hmmm, so much for having a fuel cell in my fantsy "if I win the lottery" early 911 hotrod. Plugged fuel lines, injectors, filters, etc. would not be fun on a weekend or more road trip... I am glad to hear that Dale Jr. is going to be okay...

[smoak]

I guess I am still confused as to how this happened. The smack into the tires did not look very severe but little E appeared to be dazed when the damn thing caught fire. Also, how can the fuel degrade the fuel cell. Shouldn't someone test this stuff out before they use it for this type of fuel. Scary stuff.

[ronin]

the undercar camera showed fuel leaking like crazy immediately after the crash. must have been a pretty big rupture

[}{arlequin]

I *just* saw this on cnn... made me wonder the same thing. Isn't the purpose of fuel cells and bladders to prevent the exact thing from happening? Self-sealing bladders and all that good stuff? And where was the car's fire suppression system? Did he even activate it?

I guess if the puncture was more like a huge gash, not a puncture at all, then it could turn ugly like that.