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long ago a Carrera GT crashed at the California Speedway in Fontana, CA
killing the driver and passenger, both of whom were wearing restraints
and helmets. Both men were experienced track drivers and the passenger,
a good friend of the driver, was riding to decide whether or not he would
get himself one. My understanding of events is that a Ferrari (this was
a Ferrari owners’ event, not involving the Ferrari Club) was signaled by
Pit Out to enter the track and when the driver took too long to do so,
he then disobeyed the Pit Out worker’s signal to wait until the Carrera
GT passed, and entered the hot track directly in front of the GT. The GT
driver had a choice of either creaming the recalcitrant Ferrari or trying
to avoid him, and in choosing the latter crashed, killing both occupants.
I don’t intend this to be a morbid column but there are many lessons we can take from this very tragic accident, and that is what it was, the long and short, a very tragic accident. First, and in no particular order here, I always impress upon my DE students that when entering a hot track it is that driver’s responsibility to ensure that they check their rear view mirrors, stay within the “blend line” and “step out lively”, get up to speed quickly to blend in with track traffic. Regardless of what the Pit Out worker may indicate – and in this case the driver disregarded the proper instructions – it is the responsibility of the driver entering the track to do so in a safe manner. I’ve exchanged some emails with an NER student DE driver who knew Ben Keaton – the driver, reportedly an excellent driver and long time PCA instructor – and his family very well from her time in California. She says “We know that Ben would not want us to give up the sport because of this. However, right now, we are questioning the safety of running in my stock cab (without harnesses or a true roll bar).” Safety equipment in our cars should not be an after thought. Five or six point harnesses with the appropriate slotted seats to prevent the harnesses from sliding off shoulders are a bare minimum. When you include overnight accommodations, meals, fees, gas, etc. good track seats and harnesses can be installed for what it costs to attend one or two “away events”. And as a percentage of what you paid for your Porsche, seats and harnesses amount to petty cash in the overall scheme of things. Give up that double espresso every morning and mocha latte every afternoon and you’ve paid for important safety items in a year. And you don’t have to sacrifice your three point OEM belts, use them on the street if yours is a dual purpose car. Some people have looked at this accident as an indication of the inherent danger in what we do on the track. And let’s not kid ourselves, there are dangers involved, but there are dangers lurking in most of our lives. For many of us one of the attractions of high speed performance driving is exactly that adrenaline rush, there’s nothing else like it. I’m told that sky diving and rock climbing brings similar adrenaline highs, but you’ll never catch me choosing to jump from an airplane or climb a vertical rock wall. Whatever it is that turns you on, do it as safely as possible, and enjoy life. If you’re not taking some degree of risk in your life you’ve never gotten out of bed. I regret that I can not back up my gut belief with solid statistics that our DE track driving is a relatively safe sport. I’ve been researching this for days and can not find definitive numbers. Probably because there are so many sanctioning organizations for track driving and no one that I can find has ever compiled the data into a coherent form. As one scuba web site says “…it is well known that most injuries happen to scuba divers while they are still on the boat.” My worst track accident occurred when I was stepping off my truck tail gate while unloading the car trailer, not when I totaled our 911 at Watkins Glen. The National Safety Council says that the odds of being killed during one’s lifetime as a pedestrian is 1 in 612; in an off-road motor vehicle is 1 in 4,800; as a car occupant 1 in 228; in a bath-tub 1 in 10, 582. The US Hang Gliding Assoc. put together the following stats culled from sports organizations and the NSC. The rate of fatalities per 100,000 participants is SCUBA 47; Hang Gliding 40; Skydiving 25, Power Boat racing 71, Mountaineering 50. A list of Annual US Fatalities in total numbers finds Boating #1 with 1,063; Scuba diving 105; Snowmobiling 60; Skiing 41; Skydiving 31; Football 6; Basketball 2. So be safe, but do it…and keep the shiny side up. On our recent trip to Mosport last weekend, 8.5 hours each way, I was remarking to Joyce that I could not understand the large disparity in the number of U.S. commercial trucks in Canada versus the number of Canadian trucks in the U.S. While driving the 401 for a total of about 4 hours I saw a total of 2 U.S. commercial trucks out of the hundreds we passed. In the U.S. between the border and Albany the overwhelming majority were Canadian trucks either coming from or returning to Canada. I knew that Canada is our largest trading partner, but I could not imagine our trade deficit being as large as the disparity in the number of trucks I counted. And having researched the numbers, the deficit still does not explain the difference in the numbers of commercial trucks. It must have to do with differences in the Northeast vs. other border areas i.e. mid-west and west and the different modes of transportation including ships, trains and planes. Anyway I found these numbers interesting; for the first 4 months of 2005 our four largest trading partners were Canada with 20% of our total trade, Mexico 11%, China 10% and Japan 8%. Our trade deficit with those 4 countries expressed as a percentage of our imports is: Canada 25% (we export 25% less than we import); Mexico 30%; China 80% and Japan 62%. Of the 15 largest trading partners we had a trade surplus with only one country, the Netherlands and that trade amounted to 1.6% of the total. Church Bulletin Bloopers
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