Kubica's BMW clipped the front right tyre of the parked Toro Rosso...Just look at how close the two marshals standing on the rear end of the STR02 were from being hit
This was the most serious F1 accident since May 1, 1994.A miracle that Robert's OK.
When I saw that Robert wasn't moving at all the first image that came to my mind was that horrific Senna's crash, I seriously though something extremly bad happened to him. He was so incredibly lucky.
I love the reaction of the marshall at the bottom of the screen in that you tube video
I think whoever mentioned about the safety car coming out and the cars pitting lead lap cars first then lapped cars is a good idea. We have that rule here and it works fine. They just need to tweak it a little bit to get it right. It'll work just needs some fine tuning.
Regarding Kubicas' horrible crash, shame on race control for not red flagging that race. If they were working on him for 8 MINUTES before they took him out of the car, that should have been under red flag conditions. It was WAY too severe of a wreck, with all the debris on the track, to let the cars continue running around. It's quite possible something could have gone wrong on another car and caused another accident. It's happened a number of times in racing series around the world. Track workers have been killed becuase they didn"t stop the cars when the wreck was that severe.
But I am overjoyed to see Kubica is fine after what happened. Kudos and much praise to the safety of F1. Thank God!
Ouch, that took some impact, I've never seen a modern monocoque damaged so badly, I never got a proper look at Schumi's outside the tyres. Notice however the camera is still sitting on top! What happens in these accidents is beyond our conceptions. I wonder if his shoe is still on his foot, its not all too clear from there but I've heard of road accidents where peoples shoes have been discovered some 100m down the road, still tied.
Murphy's 9th Law of Technology:
Tell a man there are 300 million stars in the universe and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it and he'll have to touch to be sure.
I think what happened to the nose cone was on the initial hit with the wall protecting the marshals and Speed's car (not in shot) the suspension was ripped out in such away that it leavered the cose cone forward and sent it flying.
If I have time today I'll try and make a little diagram.
Murphy's 9th Law of Technology:
Tell a man there are 300 million stars in the universe and he'll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint on it and he'll have to touch to be sure.
Tom wrote:I think what happened to the nose cone was on the initial hit with the wall protecting the marshals and Speed's car (not in shot) the suspension was ripped out in such away that it leavered the cose cone forward and sent it flying.
If I have time today I'll try and make a little diagram.
the nose was still on the car when clipping the protecting wall. im sure it was
Nose was on the car when it hit the wall. No doubt about it. Another observation: That wall must be not just isolated but also at least twice higher than it is now. Imagine what could have happened if Kubica's car flow over it and hit cars that were in the hairpin exit!
It appears the BMW struck the concrete wall at approximately a 60 degree angle, on the right side. Velocity is purely an estimate (anyone aware of any info on this?) but in excess of 200 kph.
The nose cone, since it impacted at an angle, broke away at the attachment points, leaving the tub to bear the brunt of the impact. On some photos it can be seen that there was a hole punched out on the top right of the front tub structure, revealing Kubica's feet. I hope and expect the FIA alters the impact criteria and dimensions of the front of the tub to extend the tub to allow even more crushing in this zone. We had an accident, let's learn from it.
A few posts have made reference to Senna's crash, and that's darn scary in that they have a lot in common. Both cars impacted a hard concrete wall at around the identical angle and speed. Senna died, and that's another topic. But Kubica came through (luckily) relatively intact.
Now, the FIA and track organizers and workers deserve commendation because they got the attention to Kubica and began the medical process for such a severe impact. It appears most of the safety systems worked.
But just why was that hard concrete wall there? Even a simple tire barrier would have been better. In allowing this hard wall to exist at such an angle to the racetrack is a failure by the FIA and it's safety inspectors.