Re "speeds kills again"

[David Ziglin <davidz@domain.elided>]

Velocity and acceleration are two different things.  Astronauts hurled into
the blue do not in fact experience particulary difficult G forces - no more
than 3G I believe (right?)

Of course speed does not kill by itself.  It is deceleration against an
immovable barrier (27 Gs or more for example [even with shallow tire walls
some times]!!) that can do it or equally forceful acceleration.  If Shuey
had hit a concrete wall instead of a tire barrier, he would be dead now.
If Shuey had hit a *substantial" tire barrier rather than the token barrier
he did hit, he would not have missed 6 races, and .........?

The inability to pass on old tracks with modern machines is a bloody bore
as suggested.  I believe part of the answer is new track
conceptualizations.  Even the track in Japan, soooooo much better than
most, is an old track and not consciously designed for 250mph machines.  (
Would you love to run a fast car on that track or what ??!!!!)

I don't believe in heroes.  However, I did have one, just one - Jimmy
Clark; I couldn't help it.  Driving a Lotus Elan then did not help my
attempted neutrality.  After his death I ran away from racing for a long
time.  Go ahead and call me irrational, but it has only been very recently
and still with difficulty that I have been able to speak his name or look
at his photograph with losing it myself.

I love auto racing and race myself, but I no longer permit myself heroes.
Nevertheless, I don't ever want to see anyone die or even be injured on a
race track.  Yes, I do indeed accept that auto racing is not like hop
scotch, that it is inherently precarious.  That's ok.  We choose our risks
freely.  However, that a concrete wall should have offered Moore no chance
to survive a crash is absurd and unforgivable.  (Recall the Olympic skier
who, a few years ago, lost it on a slope and went into a parked "snow
maker" or something at the slope side and was killed?  If the fellow had
lost it, landed on his head and broken his neck, I could accept that
easily.  But D9 tractors have no business whatever anywhere near a ski
slope and neither do concrete walls belong on race tracks.)

I believe that what the sport needs is less greed and especially more
imagination.


Air bags ?????  Figure it out; how fast would a bag have to deploy to stop
the forward movement of a body at 230mph and what effect would that have?



David

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