Penske transports burns up with IRL cars inside

[URY914]

Penske Racing's two IndyCar race chassis were destroyed when the transporter they were travelling in caught fire on the way to this weekend's race at Sears Point.

The blaze, believed to have been caused by a wheel bearing failure, could not be extinguished immediately, so the cars of Helio Castroneves and Ryan Briscoe were incinerated as the truck burned to the ground on an interstate in Wyoming.

The transporter's drivers were uninjured but could only save the truck's cab, while the majority of the team's equipment in the truck was also destroyed.

Penske team president Tim Cindric told the Indianapolis Star newspaper: "It's a disaster, a big, melted mess. It was like a house fire where it burns at the ceiling, we probably lost 80 to 90 per cent of everything on board."

The team will use their test cars, which were already in California following a test at Sonoma, for this weekend's event.

Castroneves, who trails Scott Dixon by 78 points in the championship, added: "I hope we can turn it around pretty quickly, I know my guys are going to be extremely tired but we seem to perform well in these circumstances."

Penske's headquarters suffered major losses to flood damage in 2006, but the team responded by winning the next race, at Kansas Speedway.

[URY914]

http://www.autosport.com/news/report.php/id/69910

[David]

That's surprising, the Penske transport trucks are maintained like they're the race cars!

[Por_sha911]

Someone's head will roll when Roger finds out.

[pwd72s]

Hard to predict a wheel bearing failure. So, anybody here familiar with big rigs? Are wheel bearings a scheduled replacement item?

[URY914]

I think Danica had something to do with it.....

[Jims5543]

I bet the next truck has a huge halon system in it.

[Porsche-O-Phile]

Beats having them burn up with a driver in them. The IRL cars are not exactly known for their safety, especially when compared to the Panoz DP07 chassis which were "retired" in favor of the inferior IRL design.

[Craig 930 RS]

SAME thing happen to the TRG team about 4 years ago.......

[cashflyer]

Originally Posted by pwd72s

So, anybody here familiar with big rigs? Are wheel bearings a scheduled replacement item?

I am. They are no more scheduled than the ones in your DD.

I would be surprised, given the value of the cargo and the reputation of the owner company, that this happened from negligence. I would instead suspect catastrophic failure.

[URY914]

Originally Posted by cashflyer

would instead suspect catastrophic failure.

Danica, like I said.

[Weaver]

Originally Posted by Porsche-O-Phile

Beats having them burn up with a driver in them. The IRL cars are not exactly known for their safety, especially when compared to the Panoz DP07 chassis which were "retired" in favor of the inferior IRL design.

I usually don't reply to these posts but, he we go.

No offense O-Phile, the '03 to present Dallara is a much safer racecar than the pre '03 IRL car, probably on par with the '90s Reynard and much better than the '02 Lola. There have been over 20 saftey update that I can think of, and can take one whale of a hit. We have had three over 95 g hits on both ovals and road courses and our drivers have been fine, general bruising. Two of my teammates have been on their roll hoops on the backstraight of IMS at over 217 and have walked away. Dario had a 60 g impact straight on to the roll hoop of his car and walked away. I don't think you truly understand the impact a car has on an oval.

Now before you get upset with me, I have alot of friends who stayed in CART after my team left, and have always been truthful with me. The Panoz is regarded as one of the worst cars produced in the last few years. A small list of their problems. Front suspesion points pulling out of bulkheads and hardpoints. The tub seam ( where the two halves of the tubs are bonded ) were delaminating, rendering two tubs unrepairable. Tub floors ( especially under the driver ) were cracking and delaminating. This was not from running the car too low and having hard contact, this was light contact and some curbing. The fuel cell leak was really never fully repaired, they just decided to not use the full capacity, only fill 25 gals out of the 30 gallon cell. The buckeye vent and the top of the cell never could be sealed correctly, causing gallons of fuel to leak out. Thats not very safe to me. And remember, it only raced 14 or so times, and never took a big oval hit, who to say the bulkheads or the bell housing would have held up.

Belive me, the Dallara is not that much of an inferior design, its not perfect, its no Reynard, but its not inferior to the Panoz. Which was somewhat of a flawed design, Anyway....


Penske will be fine. They had there test team equipment out there from an open test from last week. Castro Neves had one chassis and all of the pit equipment they need. The truckers said no halon system would have saved that trailer.

[gt350mike]

Originally Posted by Craig 930 RS

SAME thing happen to the TRG team about 4 years ago.......

And the same thing happened to the SunTrust team this year!

[dennis in se pa]

I can't believe this was not an anticipated event and thus planned for. It has happened before. A halon system would have been prudent. Someone dropped the ball. Sorry to hear this. Good luck to the Penske team.
Dennis in Reading, PA - former home to the team.

[Laneco]

Originally Posted by pwd72s

Hard to predict a wheel bearing failure. So, anybody here familiar with big rigs? Are wheel bearings a scheduled replacement item?

Not really a scheduled replacement item. Do you remember the Rita bus fire from a couple of years ago where the bus caught fire, burned to the ground with a load of senior citizens on board (many died)? That was also a bearing failure fire.

On significant issue is that when a race car trailer catches on fire, there's all sorts of flammable items and oxidizers on board to accelerate the fire. Once it catches, the driver has only a 5 lb or so extinguisher to put it out. Not going to happen...

Bearing fires are not uncommon. In response to the Rita incident (and numerous others that are less dramatic) many bus companies have installed or spec'd their vehicles with extinguishing systems for the engine bays and rear tire fender wells. It seems to me that as TPMS have become more prevelant (even in commercial vehicles) that adding a temperature sensor could prove a logical subsequent step. It would also be capable of monitoring brake fires - which are actually much more common than bearing failures for catching trucks on fire.

angela

[David]

I'm with Weaver on the Panoz/Dallara issue. While the Panoz is much better looking, it didn't seem to take impacts well. For instance, Paul Tracy's low speed crash that put him out for several races with a back injury.