News on Earnhardt crash

[KC]

I have just heard on our local talk radio broadcast from a press release by NASCAR, that Dale Earnhardt's left shoulder safety belt was broken when he was extricated from the car. No information has been released to say that this caused his death. The companies that produce the safety belts I am familiar with, such as Simpson, has a sterling reputation as reliable suppliers of excellent equipment. However, just as all things created by man, failures do happen.

[R]

It's never known to have happened in 52 years of NASCAR racing, though, until now. According to dr. Steve Bohannon, Earnhardt's chances of survival would have been much better if the belt hadn't broken.

[Valve Bounce]

There is a post here somewhere that wondered whether he fastened his belt properly after the last stop. In all my life, I have never heard of a seat belt failure. It could be that he was not buckled up properly. I await more info.

[Lee]

It has not ever happened in 52 years of racing. As KC said, all things made by man fail. I don't think very much can be added to that. I guess it had to happen sooner or later, but this was the worst possible time for a belt to fail.

[Joe Fan]

Wow! This latest conference appears to be a "muddying the waters" attempt by NASCAR as to what specifically happened in Earnhardt's crash so that it makes it harder to pin blame or sue anyone. This doctor Bohanon contradicted himself from what he said on Monday, that a full faced helmet would not helped. Now, he says that Earnhardt's lap belt broke and he may have hit his chin on the steering wheel causing the basilar skull fracture. This doesn't jive with the autopsy report and from what I have heard from someone's uncle who seen Earnhardt in his car after the crash through binoculars.

The autopsy report stated that Earnhardt had a skull fracture than ran from the top to the back of his head. This is consistent with the top of his helmet hitting the steering wheel. I do not believe that Earnhardt's face initially hit the steering wheel because if it did, it would have done a whole lot of obvious (a probably gory) damage to the face (which would have been seen through the binocs of the individual's uncle I mentioned above) and the autopsy report would have revealed a mandible or facial fracture. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to think about having his face x-rayed when he wore an open face helmet and it only takes a half hour to x-ray his face and have them read.

The key here is to see what Dale Jr. does since he wears an open faced helmet. If Dale Jr. doesn't switch to a full face helmet for this weekend race, then you can guarantee that this theory of his father's face hitting the steering wheel being the cause of death is total BS. No one would be that stupid in light of that specific knowledge. I think maybe that Earnhardt's face may have hit the steering secondary to his intial blow, when Schrader hit him. If his seat belt did fail and I am sure that he would have been killed in less than a second in this scenario, then his head more than likely would have hit the steering wheel in a subsequent blow or the winding down of the first one.

I do believe that it is highly possible that something happened to Earnhardt's seat belt system, because of a similar Ward Burton crash I seen in 1997 at Daytona where Ward was roughed up but lived. This was a hard hit no doubt but it should have been survivable. I know that the angle in which he hit wasn't good because the corners of the cars do not have the crush zone that the front of the car has.

One thing that entered my mind before this seat belt problem was announced and I posted this before here, is whether of not Earnhardt unbuckled any of his points of restraint after the red flag. It is typical for drivers to unbuckle and relax during a red flag situation. I wondered if Dale possibly unbuckled some of them and then forgot to rebuckle them when they went back racing. If he didn't rebuckle all of them, then it would have applied more pressure and stress on the others and you could have had the situation of a seat belt failure that they "haven't seen in 52 years in the sport."

[Ken]

I have to agree with Joe , but maybe not unbuckle his belts but just slacken them off some as 500 miles if a long time to be sitting in one spot. I have found that even after 20 laps of racing a drivers belt can slacken off some and maybe this was it in this case. I also feel the whole car has to change to make the car absorb more of the impact rather than be built like a safe with an egg inside. It is a cover up for sure as I feel Nascar as a whole has problems. They make rule changes to get the field to run close. Great for the fan deadly for the driver. I feel that a good team of layers would blow Nascar out of the water by just pointing out that it is artificial racing. One they make rules to have the field run close, two if a team shows up with a car that is within the rules but is faster they ( being Nascar) slow it down . Teams should be able to run what they bring to the track if it is within the rules. 500 miles and still inches apart just doesn't happen in racing.

[Liz]

Now they are saying it was one of the lap belts that failed - the webbing apparently came apart, at least that was what I heard. But I remember Roberto Moreno's seatbelt having come apart twice during a race and him having to go back to the pits to have it rebuckled, and it seems to me that if a person is in the heat of a race and the belt comes apart, he may gamble on it and think it will be okay until the end of the race. In lots of cases that would be true, and someone with a lot of experience might be (in the heat of battle) inclined to gamble....

I agree that if his chin hit the wheel it was probably a secondary blow; what I heard was that he was thrown to the right and I would guess he hit his right temple against the wheel - which would be a death blow and would also explain the particular skull fracture, wouldn't it?

As for Junior switching to a full face helmet for the weekend race, aren't helmets made specially to order? Would it not be virtually impossible for him to get a helmet that fit him comfortably in such a short period of time? (That is why they are all moaning about the HANS device - can't wear it because it's not comfortable). I don't think too much should be read into what kind of helmet he wears this weekend, but if he switches to a modern helmet in weeks to come, that would be testament to his ability to learn and adjust to modern realities.

On the other hand, I wonder if he would be reluctant to use the modern helmet because he might think it was showing disloyalty to his father.

[Joe Fan]

Liz, from what I have read, Dale Jr has worn a full face helmet in the past so he should have one accessible to him.

[Joe Fan]

Here is another article that will fuel the fire on the seatbelt controversy:

http://nydailynews.com/2001-02-24/Me...s/a-101007.asp

[KC]

A lot will depend on if Earnhardt or his team carried out these modifications or if they were ordered from Simpson that way. I cannot believe that Simpson would make an alteration that would compromise the effectiveness of their product no matter who asked for it.

NASCAR has denied that the belts were modified.

[KC]

Another rumor that has been floated is that several of the drivers, led by Jeff Gordon, have requested to see Earnhardt's belts and NASCAR has denied them access.

How much of this is true only NASCAR and the drivers can say.

[Joe Fan]

Here is another interesting article: http://www.roanoke.com/sports/racing...ory108096.html

[enzo]

Word back thru back channels is that Dale's belt was heat damaged during dyno runs during the week befor the crash. Seems the lap belt wasn't secured properly and slipped down to lay on the floor, which is directly above the exhaust system.

Amazing.