I read this on www.miataforum.com. It's a message that came from a
240SX mailing list:
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Ok gang, let me give a little background info on this clip. This
accident happened last year during our annual Corvette Caravan to the
Corvette Museum in Bowling Green Kentucky. An autocross course was
setup on a small section of parking lot at the Corvette assembly plant
by a few of the local Corvette clubs. This was a Saturday and Sunday
event. And I had every intentions of running both days since they said
we would probably be able to get 6 or more runs in each day. I
actually ran the course on Saturday. This accident happened on Sunday.
After walking the course I could clearly tell that the course they set
up was to large for the lot space and set too close to the curbs. It
was easy to see that a novice could get into trouble rather easily. I
made two runs on the course and decided that I wanted no part of this
particular autocross. There were three main reasons. One, was that a
few of the course workers were sitting down at their stations! The
second was that the sweeping turn before the slalom had a patch of oil
that couldn't be avoided the way they had the course set up. No amount
of kitty litter (or whatever it is they used) seem to clean it
up. Every time I came through that turn I would get squirrelly going
into the slalom and have to slow down to keep from losing control (oil
on my tires?). The third was that the slalom was setup parallel to the
curb and maybe a car length and a half away from the curb. The blue
vette in the clip lost control midway through this slalom section,
jumped the curb and hit the worker who, according to spectators I had
asked that witnessed it first hand, had been sitting in his folding
chair and was trying to get up and out of the way when he got hit.
Anyway, I decided to go and a least watch the Sunday autocross before
I left to come home and I must have arrived at the site maybe a minute
or two after the incident and a few minutes before the paramedics
arrived. The worker was unconscious but still breathing. From the
video it looks as though he was already standing but I think if you
look closely you will see what I think is a red folding chair go
flying in the air. Still no real sure if he was actually sitting, I
can only go by what I was told by a few people at the site.
Now let me tell you a little about Corvette events. Just as we have
SCCA the Corvette clubs have NCCC. This event was NOT an NCCC
sanctioned event. However it was setup by clubs that normally do run
NCCC events. Just like we setup an autocross for the Year One group at
Commerce recently. Even though it was not SCCA sanctioned we still
stuck to our rules and safety methods. So what I'm trying to say is
that workers sitting down at their stations seems to be the norm at
NCCC events. Why is this? Well, NCCC events do not have a run/work
order. Drivers who enter these events are under no obligation to work!
This is handled by volunteers of the hosting Club. So these volunteers
are asked to work a station for hours on end with little if any
relief. I'll have to admit, I'd be tempted to take a chair and
umbrella myself! However, being a little wiser now I wouldn't dare be
a volunteer.
Paul Barros
96 Silver Corvette #7 OSP
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john@idsfa.net John Stimson
http://www.idsfa.net/~john/ HMC Physics '94
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