Massa crashes after being hit by heave spring

[natef1]

AP news wire are reporting to both BBC and Sky that Massa is in a "life threatening but stable condition" and will be put to sleep until tomorrow. He is also receiving assisted breathing apparatus.

[nae]

enclosed cockpits or just straight justification for why they get paid so much
for risking their life's.

shame its massa, by all accounts a decent chap

had he been doing it for, lets say a soldiers wage, then I would have
more sympathy but he is paid millions effectively to risk his life and
what's worse (like it or not) to risk his life's for our entertainment.

personally i can see max electing to stay on till 'this is sorted out'

yet more sanitised sport to follow shortly

[ringo]

It seems as if it was the edge of the steering wheel that dealt the major damage in the video.

[RacingManiac]

Assuming the 800g spring hits Massa with a relative speed of 290kph(as if the spring is stationary and the car travels at 290kph), it exerts something like 250J or energy....consider a .22LR bullet has about 150J, a 9mm has about 500J, the hit is not insignificant.....

Check your math - 0.8*75^2/2=2250J.
Quite an impact.

my mistake...using windows calculator probably misplaced a decimal point...

comparison, an AK round exerts ~ 2000J at muzzle, M16 ~1500J....

A hell of a punch to the helmet....

[Ray]

A central hit on the visor would have probably been less dangerous. Those visors are bullet proof. The edge is probably the weakest point of that structure.

doubt it, that would have been the worst place, straight on at the visor would have been disastrous, might be bulletproof(doubt that too) but it ain't spring proof.

Yes but bullets are also designed to penetrate something. Springs are blunt, they have rounded edges on the coils and flat tops and bottoms. So it might have been better, or worse to have hit only the visor. We don't know unless they test it. But to think a spring is more dangerous just because it's bigger than a bullet is foolish, bullets are pointy for a reason. And the fact that it took an impact from a spring and didn't shatter on the edges shows that it is indeed 'spring proof'.

Assuming the 800g spring hits Massa with a relative speed of 290kph(as if the spring is stationary and the car travels at 290kph), it exerts something like 250J or energy....consider a .22LR bullet has about 150J, a 9mm has about 500J, the hit is not insignificant.....

Again, bullets are pointy, springs are not. Not saying it isn't a significant impact it very much was obviously, but they test with sharp objects because they focus all the energy in a small area.

the explosion in an exploding bolt can easily be self contained, it wouldn't even have to blow off the canopy like in a jet, but merely release the canopy.

That is a very very bad idea. Those can be accidentally set off by a mechanic in the pits, and for cripes sake it's an explosive! You cannot have them in a closed environment without an disproportionate increase in risk. What if it was tripped on the race track and you have a canopy either flying through the air or laying on the track around a blind corner. Why increase the risk for miniscule gain?!? It makes no sense. I'll go back to what I said in another thread, why put a FOD screen on a passenger jet engine and increase your risk of it coming loose and going into an engine to prevent a very small risk of a bird strike? With that screen over the engine during all times it is operating, you have increased the risk of something being ingested to takeoff and landing to whenever the engine is running. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. What if the canopy got stuck and the car was on fire? Since we are talking about the very rare happening here, that's a very valid thing to point out.

What if the drivers helmets had a steel cage like a hockey mask in front of the mask? Might look goofy, but Massa would only have a bent cage right now, and maybe a concussion, but likely no injury to his face.

Again, you're adding another element of risk to the equation. What if an object hit said cage and it dislodged from the helmet and it pierced the visor? What if it came detached after an impact and ended up on the track and another car hit it, flattened a tire and the car hit the barrier?

The canopy could be made so perhaps it was one really strong roll bar (to protect driver from other cars) and the rest a bit weaker, so it would shatter in an impact like todays, dissipating some energy and deflecting any objects. It could also have quite an aerodynamic advantage, getting rid of the imperfections in the airflow the cockpit and driver cause.

Ask yourself if you would get in a car, that had a windshield that was designed to completely shatter upon impact with an object. Why in the world would you even entertain that idea?!? If that car flipped and the drivers visor popped open and then that canopy shattered it would easily get in his eyes. I just don't get how that could even be thought of as a solution.

All these ideas floating around only increase risk, nothing but knee jerk reactions to an age old problem. I don't have an answer, but I do know that none of these being tossed out are good ones.

[Giblet]

Saying that a metal face mask over the visor could be more dangerous to other cars is a negative way to look at it.

For the mask to come dislodged, the driver would have to be hit in the face with something very strong. It is about harm reduction. Massa with no broken face, vs a metal face mask on the track that just saved his face? They wouldn't come off willy nilly, just like visors don't.

Your argument is like saying airbags should be outlawed because of an occasional boken nose, and very few deaths even though they save countless lives.

[Ray]

What's even more amazing is that Brawn so stupidly sent that car back out on the track if they KNEW something was amiss. I think that after they said that Brawn should be sat out of this race. Nothing is more dangerous than knowing something is wrong with a car and sending it out anyway. If you think I'm overreacting ask your self this. What if, God forbid, it happened to kill someone? Would you think it is an overreaction then?

And I watched a few different replays of the incident and it appears that Massa turned his head slightly before the impact. I might be wrong, but if he did he has amazing reflexes! Reminds me of him swerving around that wheels cover that fell off a Renault awhile back. And I would hazard a guess that the impact with the steering wheel when he hit the tires may have caused alot of that damage to his helmet rather than the spring. The impact with the spring broke his visor and knocked him out, but alot of the structural damage may have happened with the impact with a much harder, thicker, and robust steering wheel.

[Ray]

Saying that a metal face mask over the visor could be more dangerous to other cars is a negative way to look at it.

For the mask to come dislodged, the driver would have to be hit in the face with something very strong. It is about harm reduction. Massa with no broken face, vs a metal face mask on the track that just saved his face? They wouldn't come off willy nilly, just like visors don't.

Your argument is like saying airbags should be outlawed because of an occasional boken nose, and very few deaths even though they save countless lives.

How would you mount it? Screws? Epoxy? If it came dislodged it could bend around his helmet and pierce his neck. Airbags are not an apples to apples comparison. Airbags absorb impacts without any sharp edges and no risk of penetrating any part of your body, plus they aren't always going to go off. Plus Massas' head had a massive impact with the steering wheel, how would a cage do in that situation? I think having something metal directly attached to the front of a helmet is more of a risk than it mitigates for simple reasons about how it would be mounted and what kind of damage it would do to a helmet in an impact with a steering wheel.

[ringo]

A redesign on the helmets is the next most logical thing; i am thinking of bullet proof visors and an extended forehead on the helmet. The extended part would be made of impact energy absorbing material, something more pliant than what the rest of the helmet is made of.



ok guys no dirty jokes of what the impact zone looks like

i would suggest heart rate monitors in the car and eye movement detectors, this way the team will know how their driver is doing and they should be able to wirelessly stop the car in the event of an accident. This would be the only time the teams would have any feedback control of the car.

[n smikle]

800g! that is freaking heavy!!


Could this be Proof that Barichello's car is not as well prepared as Button's?

[ISLAMATRON]

the explosion in an exploding bolt can easily be self contained, it wouldn't even have to blow off the canopy like in a jet, but merely release the canopy.

That is a very very bad idea. Those can be accidentally set off by a mechanic in the pits, and for cripes sake it's an explosive! You cannot have them in a closed environment without an disproportionate increase in risk. What if it was tripped on the race track and you have a canopy either flying through the air or laying on the track around a blind corner. Why increase the risk for miniscule gain?!? It makes no sense. I'll go back to what I said in another thread, why put a FOD screen on a passenger jet engine and increase your risk of it coming loose and going into an engine to prevent a very small risk of a bird strike? With that screen over the engine during all times it is operating, you have increased the risk of something being ingested to takeoff and landing to whenever the engine is running. It makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. What if the canopy got stuck and the car was on fire? Since we are talking about the very rare happening here, that's a very valid thing to point out.

You obviously have no idea about modern explosives, which are designed to be extremely stable and most require a chemical reaction to initiate. They operate more like the fuse of a warhead then TNT. Much less volatile than the fuel in the cars, and like I said they dont need to eject the canopy(which can be tethered to the car) it just needs to release it to give access to the driver. Explosions dont need to be big, think of the pop caps you used to throw as a child. It is not the only solution but just an idea i put out there for discussion.

Why do you think that explosive bolts would be so much more dangerous in a racecar than in a jet plane with military bombs on board? You do know that they use the explosive bolts not only for the cockpits but also to release the bombs & missiles from their perches.

[ISLAMATRON]

800g! that is freaking heavy!!


Could this be Proof that Barichello's car is not as well prepared as Button's?

joking are you? ever held a car spring in your hand? 800 grams is feather light

[Ray]

Trying to delete this post but I can't

[timbo]

Why do you think that explosive bolts would be so much more dangerous in a racecar than in a jet plane with military bombs on board?

Jetplanes are never ever exposed to such vibrations as F1 cars.

[Ray]

Again, trying to delete a few posts. For some reason Firefox hung and it posted the same reply about three times!