JGTC Ferrari driver court ruling...

That's a sickening shunt. Amazing he lived. Very lucky man.

 

Still convinced Ferrari road cars are safe?

For all the people who have asked recently why Ferraris in accidents they've read about always seem to have caught fire:

Watch this video!

Where is the fuel tank in the 911? Obviously not under the bonnet, so the Ferrari has to be at fault for that fire.

 

That accident was terrible. Its hard to watch. It appears that the officials were grossly negligent in leaving Tetsuya Ota in the car for 90 seconds as it burned. Its hard to imagine why they would have only awarded him 9million yen ($85,000).

One has to ask questions about the location of the fuel tank in F-cars. As others have mentioned one common theme of F-car accidents is fire. Mounting the fuel tank under the motor (as I understand F-cars have - please correct me if I am wrong) cannot be a good idea. Mounting it in the front is also a bad idea. One would think the 360 race car would have been running a special bladder and tank, but I guess you cant get away from the tank being located under the motor. Lots of L-car accidents also involve fire. I guess the moral to the story is to find a better place to mount the fuel tank.

 

The car in the video is a 355, and they have a terribly crude aluminium tank that has near zero structural integrity. It would split if you dropped it. I've even seen cars with leaks from welds where the internal baffles are fixed in.

The 360 race cars do have bladder tanks, and they are better located, but still vulnerable.

That shunt is big enough to bugger pretty much anything though.

 

I hope this isn't the beginning of the end of auto racing in Japan. He should not have sued. Racing is dangerous. That's a fact of the sport.

Mark Donohue understood this. Upon his death, his family disobeyed his wishes and sued Goodyear. For the good of the sport, the case was settled by Goodyear---out of court.

A life altering injury is a terrible thing but we must take responsibility for our own actions when we knowingly place ourselves in dangerous situations.

Just my .02

Tom

 

I agree up to a point. Racing is by nature dangerous. But if safety and rescue crews are derelict in their duties, that's a whole other issue.

 

It's about time someone finally acknowledged this. The last time I mentioned the safety of Ferraris (especially from the 90's and earlier), people were deluding themselves by saying it was 'scaremongering.' Despite the fact that my information came from two Ferrari employees.

 

Define "derelict". Should they have gotten him out in 75 sec. 60 sec, 20 sec. ?

We have to be careful about throwing such words around. Workers at most races are volunteers. Well trained, caring and , generally, taken for granted. If we start blaming the workers (or anyone else for that matter) and even allow lawsuits to be filed. That will be the death of racing.

There. Now you've gotten .04 out of me.

 

Obviously I know nothing more about the details than anyone else here. I am only making an assumption based on the verdict. My hat is always off to the dedicated workers at races of all levels. I agree that there is no lack of care, devotion and ability on the part of the participants. However, the JGTC is a pretty big series, and I would imagine the finger is being pointed at the overall organization of these teams of workers, which ultimately indicts the race organizers. That being said, it is a very grey area when a racing driver gets injured. I'm am generally anti-litigious, and again not knowing all the details am assuming a determination of cause for these awards. I know the SCCA is always pushing for member participation as corner workers--without them there is no racing. And I can only imagine how one law suit could tear down years of hard work. What is more unique in this particular case is that it's a driver who filed the lawsuit. Usually it seems to be some sanctioning body against another. Or the family of a driver killed on-track. In cases such as those, it's common for bystanders to claim that the deceased driver wouldn't want this dragged through court. It's racing, it's dangerous, etc. But here we have a survivor, and, well, he sued! Now take a guy like Zanardi. I'm sure if pressed, he could have found a way to make somebody pay for his near-fatal accident. Be it poor chassis design (Reynard?), poor track design (Lausitzring), whatever. But instead he embraced the miracle of surviving, praising the incredible efforts of the rescue teams.

 

Well said. I agree that if a case can be made for dereliction....a suit may be justified. But, in the world of auto racing, you have to be very, very careful. You mentioned Alex Zanardi. What happened is he left the pits too "enthusiastically" on cold tires. The car snapped sideways and he was t-boned. It would have been relatively easy for a good lawyer to make a case that the accident was caused by CART not allowing the use of tire warmers (they do now) as is done in F1. But Zanardi didn't pursue it.

There is a very thin thread holding all of racing together and safe from litigation. Once that thread is broken, sponsors, organizers, manufacturers, etc. will bail out and the end of racing would soon follow.

Thanks for having this discussion in a mature, unemotional manner. It has really made me think about how much I enjoy the sport and, perhaps, others,
to not take it for granted.

 

Above it says "90 million yen". So... Y90,000,000 equates to approximately $900,000. Exchange rates vary, but typically moving over a decimal place provides a rough approximation.

Shocking video. Saw it posted on ather board and it is making its rounds.

 

Graphic video but aparently the driver survived. Dunno about the guy waving the flag on the tower thing

http://www.motorsportmediamulti.com/Tetsuya_Ota_1998_Japanese_GT/TBK_FAMEFLAME_DK_Tetsuya_Ota-1998_Japanese_GT_Championship_at_Fuji_International_Speedway.mpg

 

On May 3, 1998 Japanese racing star Tetsuya Ota was involved in a chain reaction collision during a GT championship race. Ota was trapped in his car for more than 50 seconds while exposed to 800-degree temperatures. There was no safety crew coming to the rescue as fellow drivers frantically extinguished the flames. The result ended with serious burns to Ota and a lawsuit against track promoters and sponsors. Agreed upon event requirements called for safety crews to rescue a driver and extinguish any fire within 30 seconds or less. Ota signed papers claiming he would not seek damages from event organizers as is typical in some venue use agreements. In a District Court ruling, the hold harmless paperwork was thrown out and Ota was awarded 90 million ($809,352) Yen. Changes in the sport now include a “doctor car” and some fire engines standing by for such an emergency. The court also ruled that Ota could have slowed his vehicle quicker thus a reduction from the originally requested 300 million ($2,697,841) Yen. Some suggest that if it were not for TV coverage of the fire, Ota could not have proved his case of the 50 second time lapse. TV Tokyo Corp. was held partially responsible in the case.

 

Btw, its a 355

 

why did the collision cause such an immediate ignition of the flame? both cars ended up on fire, but the 355 obviously much more so.

horrific stuff

doody.

 

i have no idea. Also, the sound also seems unrealistic. It could have been put in afterwards. Still scary

 

http://members.roadfly.org/dakar2m/aftermath2.mpeg

This shows you the gross incompetence of the rescue crew. God I want to slap the rescue guy for leaving the Ferrari driver unattended. Jesus f'ing Christ it sickens me.

 

If you go frame by frame, it's evident the fuel cell in the Porsche was completely ruptured in the impact. In one frame, it looks like a water fountain is shooting out the front of the Porsche....not cool.

 

That is terrible, i'm glad he sued them. Can you imagine if he had a broken neck or something? They could have killed him. Stupid idiots shouldn't be anywhere near a racetrack. I can't get over the fact that they just left him there.

 

Didn't the 355 hit right where its fuel tanks are too?

 

Yep

 

Perhaps it is... I'm not 100% certain. I googled for Porsche 911 fuel tanks and found websites selling racing tanks which are mounted under the bonnet...

The concept seemed so stupidly dangerous that I originally discounted it. But again looking at the video, it does seem like the explosion erupts from under the Porsche's bonnet, in line with the door of the Ferrari (which is too far forward for it to have been the Ferrari's tanks going up initially.)

 

Apologies about that. I meant $850,000, not $85,000. And I realised that it was a 355, but it was too late to edit my post. Doh!

Y1M is around $10k as a rule of thumb (in the current climate). XE.com converted it to 850k.