Carrera GT Crash Settled at $4.5m

It just goes to show what can happen in a "perfect storm" situation, this time with the Ferrari Owners Club apparently contributery by ignoring their own rules.
The article is well written with a lot of positive information on how to stay out of legal trouble when running a track event.

 

This stuff drives me crazy. When you go on a race track in a 600hp car. You are at risk! It's just that simple. These track days are numbered. It's just a matter of time before they cut this stuff out. The attorneys will sue everyone and no one will be able to get insurance for these events. This sport is dangerous. You are going 100 mph plus in a 3000 lbs car. You can get hurt. Even the professionals get hurt or die sometimes. Just makes me sick, $4.5 million. Makes me think twice about giving rides at track days.

 

A couple of thoughts on the incident:

1. CGT's are flawed; too much oversteer by design (or lack thereof)
2. The track seemed to have used a flat wall rather than a tapered Jersey-Barrier (differences can be seen by comparing the bottom of each photo below).

The tapered bottom of the Jersey-barrier transfers *some* of the impact force by rolling or flipping the vehicle. Flat walls do not mitigate the force of the impact at all.
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what a farce.
what right have these ppl to literally demand that a car has electronic aids.

sorry guys but this whole issue (as sad as it is) seems to me to justify that america is seen by the rest of the world as being "sue happy"




now ive organised a fair few trackdays here in the uk and the bottom line is that both drivers and passengers sign a waiver before theyre allowed out - and that should be the end of it.

 

i don't even know what to say...how the hell could porsche possibly have to pay anything? there shouldn't even be a case for this, just chalk it up as a very unfortunate and sad event but of course SOMEONE always has to be at fault.

 

Do we really need another thread?: Please see http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/showthread.php?t=171898

That thread has been done to the end and over again, please discuss there and save Rob some disc space!
Pete

 

This coming from someone with SEVEN THOUSAND posts who can't even be bothered to send Rob a lousy $15?!!! $25?!!! If you are so concerned about Rob, write a check...

The judgement was just published – this is new news. Regardless, who put you in charge of what people get to talk about, how often people get to talk about it, or in how many different subject-line posts? Mind your own business and join in the discussions you choose to join in. You don't like it, change channels.

 

No HANS device = fail.

 

Okay you almost did a good job on attacking me ... but one thing you missed.

Go and click on the link to the existing FerrariChat thread I posted and you will see it is EXACTLY the same link to EXACTLY the same article. So yeah sure lets start another thread ... heck I'll go and start ten just for fun ... why not 100 , lets really go crazy!

So I appologise I should have simply said "repost".

Have a nice day.
Pete

 

That's why we'll never see something as cool as this built here

http://www.ascari.net/secciones.php?idioma=2&&seccion=15&PHPSESSID=3dcac382d7ba6dbb2eae5a7cf941d175

 

Careful putting all your eggs in one basket.

The very last thing we want people to think is that the HANS device will save you from any accidents. Many fools think like this about airbags ...
Pete

 

I believe Mr. Keaton died from a basal skull fracture. Instantaneous. That could've possibly been prevented or have been a less severe injury with a HANS device. The other guy was still alive and died in the hospital.

 

Yes, but my point was we should not be saying to everybody that if they wear a HANS device they will always be alright, which is how your post could be read.

That is the same BS marketing campaign that manufacturers of airbags used and as we all know is incorrect. Thus the HANS device will help but there is no 100% solution to surviving any accident other than luck.
Pete

 

people buy exotic cars and they think they also bought talent . I was there the week before, the passenger was going to purchase the car that day so he wanted to have ride in the car. Cal speed way is fast track, it is not easy to drive street cars over there.
I was driving my GT3 on street tires and on the oval I was only doing 153mph and I have been there with race cars before with much higher speeds.
However, at the end it is the A** H**e lawyers who can bring any excuse to cheat everybody.

 

Hell, I think I did a great job attacking you!

 

I don't wonder how they could've. I'm suprised more of it hasn't happened yet. Manufacturers may be sued out of their ability to sell cars w/ this kind of hp, designed for the street. It's kind of a new phenomenon. Give it time, and we'll see what happens

 

I honestly cannot believe that Porsche settled – it seems like a massively scary precedent. So if the two people died as a result of trama caused by a roll-over, could Porsche have been sued because it wasn't a hardtop? Afterall, a convertible is an inherently flawed design, right? What utter nonsense.

Can you believe the guy was allowed to spin out four times and he never got black-flagged? Where was standard race protocal ("spin and you're in"). 1st spin - mandatory trip to hot pit lane to talk to a steward. Second spin, another mandatory trip to hot pit lane where the steward likely pulls you off the track for a session. Third spin? Day's over. Duh. Forth spin? C'mon Driver, have some respect for your own limitations for god's sake! Especially when your limitations can get people hurt or even killed. And shame on the FOC for policing this thing like an election in Haiti.

Oh and, for one of his spins, his passenger was the FOC “event coordinator”!!! Thank you Mr. FOC Event Coordinator for having your head so far up Mr. VIP Supercar’s ass that you didn’t want to hurt his feelings or not get invited to his next party. It’s OK, we don’t like track days anyway, and we all think that car manufacturers should have to be held liable for building – or not building – a car a certain way. No really, thanks...

And, besides my selfish rantings portending the demise of track days as we know them and automotive design free will, two people died!!!

I hope the FOC hung this guy up by his nads and that FNA took his car away from him.

What a needless, nonsensical – and totally avoidable loss, capped only by such an undignified ending with lawyers trolling for dollars (although this was one of the rare times when a lawsuit was reasonable to a degree. But that degree should NOT have included the car manufacturer and certainly not the driver in the second car).

(Sorry, if any of the people I am attacking are friends of yours. Hell I'VE been the friend who's done seriously dumb sh*t that's affected my friends. And I also know what it's like to stick by somebody who's made HUGE mistakes. And I'm sure no one who knew the driver can stomach seeing his actions dredged up again and being largely blamed for this whole thing. So, seriously - sorry.)

 

I don't like the lawsuit angle, but after watching Jay Leno spin out here at Talladega in his CGT I've been under the impression that the CGT is a flawed design.

If you've ever raced at Talladega (I have) you know that the SuperSpeedway is so steeply banked that you never let off the throttle. You go through the curves wide open. It's unreal. It's frightening.

But spinning out without lifting the throttle or hitting the brakes on such a track is the car's fault, not the driver's.

Leno's lucky to still be alive. The CGT is a killer.

 

Pen, I don't see that kind of a lawsuit trend comming. Too many people want convertibles, lawyers just cannot take on those many people. Those #'s enable the legislators step in and stop that kind of a trend. (Just as they did when the lawyers started after the gun manufacturers. Lot's of gun owners. Congress stepped in).

Not so with $500K sports cars sporting 500 + hp. How many people really care?

 

I'm pretty sure there are several in the US already and a couple planned. I think there's one in Texas and one being planned in PA right now.

 

$4.5 million. Wonder how much was covered by insurance?

I just threw up in my mouth. Again.

 

I'm betting parts of the settlement is so that Porsche doesn't have to defend against any further scrutinization of the CGT. The article states that their engineers were inconsistent in their testimony about the car needing electronic stability. They are also only responsible for $360K (8% of the settlement) which is also probably cheaper than the legal fee's would have been should the case continue. Also, if the case made it to court and it was proven that the CGT's should have had electronic stability management systems installed, they would have to pay to recall every single CGT and retrofit the cars. Not to mention the millions in bad publicity. I'm guessing that you won't see a huge article about this settlement on a mainstream news outlet like CNN...probably just a small blurb if anything at all.

You can really blame society for this. Just about anytime something catastrophic happens, there is a lawsuit. I was once involved in a lawsuit regarding a car accident and this was when I learned that the standard legal manuever is to name everyone in the lawsuit and then worry about who is actually responsible later.

 

My comments are not meant to lambast lawyers, so much. They're just doing they're job. It's really other people's agendas, whether it be greed or really even good intentions on the most part for some I'm sure, that more to blame. imo

I agree, I don't see porsche as needing to fight this one. (pick you battles, maybe?). And they don't either, or they would have (if they didn't, that is).

I do not believe I'm pointing anything out that Porsche, Ferrari, Ford, etc, haven't had come up in a meeting or two though.

 

I always though that paying was an admission of wrongdoing. Isn't that why the tobacco industry has fought every single case down to the dollar? Doesn't this open the door for the next person hurt in CGT to sue the company and essentially automatically win? I just don't see how a car of this type could be deemed unsafe from an engineering standpoint - 911's were tricky as hell to drive too back in their day and a CGT is 1000x the car than a 1978 911 from an engineering sophistication standpoint. Some cars are just harder to drive than others and require a degree of skill that people don't automatically have. How can that possibly be a car company's fault? This is a far cry away from the Corvair debacle, when a car designed for everyday family use had an intrinsic design flaw that caused massive oversteer. Can an average Joe who's has practically zero experience riding a motorcycle (but has an m/c license) go buy a new open-class Ducati, crash his brains out on his first ride and sue Ducati? talk about a "design" flaw.. that new Ducati GP replica makes 200 (!) horsepower in a 375 lb bike!!! Now, by any measure, that bike will be a handful to all but the most experienced riders - is that a "design flaw?"

Oh well, I'll stop my yapping...

I worked for Honda's ad agency in the 80's when the 3-wheel ATV's were pulled off the market - what a mess. Little kids getting killed in ATV accidents because their moron father crashes the ATV at the campsite riding the kid in his lap. No helmet on the kid's head and about nine Bud Lights in the dad's belly. And somehow, it was Honda'a fault. And those three-wheelers were indeed tricky to drive. And so was a Honda 500cc 2-stroke motocross bike. And a water ski....

And back then, we were all waiting for some sort of hammer to fall on the sport bikes - Congressionally mandated horsepower limits or something - and that was back when the bikes had a fraction of the performance capability they have now, but it never happened...

Ooops, I forgot, I was supposed to have stopped my yapping...sorry.