Dale Ernhardt's Crash Report:

[McRat]

http://download.nascar.com/NASCAR/NascarBook_withThumbnails.pdf

Old news, but first time I've seen it.

Punchline starts at PG 158 IMO. Conclusion from page 145 seems not to agree?

 

[MACKIN]

That is a whole bunch of reading ,a novel worth ! It was finally probably just completed .

 

[Slammed2007Lbz]

The link doesn't work for me, could someone post up the pages that are worth reading?

 

[Whitetail Addict]

The file was too large for me to download. I'd like to read the pertinent information as well.

Dale Earnhardt was my childhood hero, and I was in the infield of DIS on 2/18/01, I will always remember that day...

 

[McRat]

Go right-click, save as. It's 57 meg. Most of it is CV's (resumes) and the like. There are some bloody pictures of the driver's compartment, and the autopsy though.


Brief -

His left waist harness belt tore at the adjuster roller. His head bent the steering wheel. He broke 9 left ribs, but no right ribs. Death was from a sharp blow under the chin against the steering wheel which broke the back of his skull, and also the back of his skull at the hairline hit something inside the car. He broke his left foot.

It was a "perfect storm" accident. When he hit the other car, it rotated his body into a position so his head could come down onto the steering wheel when he hit the wall. He hit the wall at the worst position angle. The broken lap belt didn't kill him, the open face helmet didn't kill him, nor would a HANS device necessarily saved him. He actually would have been saved by an airbag IMO.

 

[McRat]

I don't know how to cut pages from a PDF on this computer.

 

[Whitetail Addict]

Thanks Pat!

 

[McRat]

PS - If you can download it, and you like tech literature, it's pretty interesting.

 

[Whitetail Addict]

I have it downloading now. It's 61% complete using the right click method.

 

[1953drtelco]

IV. Summary and Conclusion
The Earnhardt crash has been described by some as “not looking that bad”. However,
analysis demonstrates it to have been an extremely severe crash in terms of its velocity
change, its peak acceleration, and its significantly more frontal principal direction of
force. The crash was preceded by a biodynamically significant impact between the
Thirty-Six Car and the Three Car which resulted in a rightward prepositioning of
Mr. Earnhardt in the last fraction of a second prior to wall impact. As a result of the wall
impact, Mr. Earnhardt moved generally forward and to the right from his rightward
deviated position with the left side of his head leading and his head tending to swing back
towards the left. During this response, the left lap belt webbing separated under load
allowing a greater forward and rightward excursion and more significant contact with the
steering wheel from the left part of Mr. Earnhardt’s upper body and potentially the left
posterior portion of his head. During rebound, Mr. Earnhardt’s body moved rearward
with respect to the vehicle and curved more and more to the left. Contact with the
posterior portion of his head could also have occurred in this phase with aft structures
rather than against the steering wheel. Mr. Earnhardt’s death likely resulted from an
impact to the occipital scalp in the presence of neck tension producing a fatal ring
fracture.
Three unusual events acting together were responsible for the tragic outcome of this
crash. The first and most significant is the severity and direction of the impact against
the wall. The component of velocity acting towards the wall and the relatively frontal
nature of the resulting impact produced an unusually severe and unfortunately directed
crash event. The second factor was the prior collision with the Thirty-Six Car at a time
so close to the unusually severe wall impact that the occupant was dislodged from a
normal position just prior to the wall crash. This motion also produced forward
displacement of the helmet with respect to the head, leaving portions of the posterior
head somewhat exposed. The occupant motion in response to both impacts was likely
affected by the choice of restraint system routing. The third event was the separation
under load of the left lap belt webbing in the adjuster as a result of dumping. The timing
of that separation cannot be determined but it was clearly such that significant load was
carried by the restraint prior to the separation and significantly greater response forward
and to the right of the occupant occurred following the separation. The near
simultaneous occurrence of these three unusual events resulted in the death of Mr.
Earnhardt probably as a result of direct head contact.

 

[MACKIN]

It's 324 pages which ones you want? :happy2:

 

[Whitetail Addict]

I've been reading it. It brings back that Sunday.

 

[McRat]

IV. Summary and Conclusion
The Earnhardt crash has been described by some as “not looking that bad”. However,
analysis demonstrates it to have been an extremely severe crash in terms of its velocity
change,....

That's PG 145.

However read the report it comes from starting at 158.

That is more significant.

 

[THEREDDEVIL]

I get choked up everytime I revisit that day. We watched the whole race and the aftermath. I couldn't pick my jaw up off the floor for about a half hour after hearing the press conference. Still seems unreal almost 12 years later