John Force Accident due to NHRA negligence

On 9/23/2007 John Force suffered the worst accident of his long, illustrious career caused by Kenny Bernstein's car crossing the center line and flinging one of the intermediate timing boxes into his right rear tire causing his car to go out of control. Having twice written to NHRA, ESPN and John Force Racing nothing is being done as can be seen by subsequent races. How long will this continue? Until someone gets killed? Will AAA, John Force's sponsor do something?

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• John
• Force
• Crash
• NHRA
• AAA
• ESPN
• Kenny
• Bernstein

[oilpride]

The slow motion footage clearly shows the timing block flying across the lane behind John's car. I'm certain that it never made contact with the left tire, how on earth could it?? The tire burst well after the cone flew across. Something else caused the tire to desintegate.

[ronh1936]

@oilpride The right rear tire.

[ronh1936]

I don't believe we can resolve this with 100% certainty, but I don't believe it was the left tire sibce the car veered sharply to the right, indicating that the left tire still had traction.

Also note that when the box flew over there, debris flew from Force's car at the right, and after the car started its right turn, the left rear of the body was still pretty much intact.

One of the ESPN announcers - live comment as it happened - thought it was the right rear.

[dragracer89]

It was proved that the timing block had nothing to do with why the car broke apart, it never hit the tire that caused the accident. the left rear slick suffered horrible vibration of some sort and that is what caused the car to break apart. and you are right it is supposed to break apart but the drivers compartment is supposed to stay intact in a situation like this

[ronh1936]

I disagree with anyone vehemently that the timing box had nothing to do with it. I have looked at many clips from, and I concluded that the timing box flew into the right rear fender well behind the tire and with the clockwise rotation of the wheel was dragged all the way above the tire shredding it.

I have never heard or seen vibration tearing apart a tire as this incident.

Boxes are still flying, so far luckily mostly by the trailing car.

[3fan4eva]

Well actually, this may sound crazy but the car is suppose to break apart at a hard impact.....it dissapates energy but with John's accident I think it broke at the wrong place.

But I do agree with you they do need to either move the timing blocks or make them outta some sorta Fiber Optics along the walls.....because Im sure it could be done.

[ronh1936]

@3fan4eva The problem with the Force car was that the cage did not extend far enough to prevent injuries to feet and hands, even though arms are restrained from thrashing about. I think they have improved on the cage design.

[cfaulc]

F Y I, I retired from this business and at one time worked for JFR and I must say you are like most fans that have absolutly NO CLUE what you are talking about! Those timing blocks are FOAM RUBBER and at one time were stirofoam and in no way can or will puncture a tire. Medlen, Force, and Hights chassis failures were due to harmonics, heat teated tubing failure, and possibly missed or poor maintanence. Stick to being a fan and leave it to us professionals why don't you!

[dcving66]

Wow! So many accident investigators analyzing this video. I'm no expert in the matter, but you can clearly see the blocks go behind the car. I'm sorry if this upsets those of you who feel like they have a P.H.D in investigating car accidents. The reason NHRA has'nt done any changes is because there is no issue to change. Race cars have been hitting timing blocks for many years. If racers felt unsafe with timing blocks on the track, they would make it an issue.

[VGMurders]

To the poster of the video STFU you don't know what you're talking about.

[JimmyEganDavis13]

@regbird1 a block is made of rubber I don't think a foam piece of rubber can blow a funny car body apart

[TheMoezilla]

@cfaulc

I agree. Ford racing explained the extreme vibrations that caused the tire to come apart in a pretty informative video they put out a year or two after the Dallas wreck. Pretty sure they were very involved in the newer, safer funny car chassis that came out after the wreck.....or maybe I don't know what I'm talking about either?

[regbird1]

looks to me like the block hit his rear quarter and blew the body apart,the tire probably blew when he hit the wall

[charles81265]

@ronh1936 LEFT TIRE!!!

[IExposeMormonism]

Part of the cure is K wall all the way down. Then you place the boxes, etc in /on the K wall. It's only concrete. You drill a few holes.

[lerroc]

@ronh1936 the tires on these cars can withstand 10,000lbs of torque and you think a foam box could puncture it? go throw a spunge under a truck and tell me what happens....

[jmerre47]

The tire was coming apart before the timing block ever came close to Force's car. Look at about the 27 second mark. Right above the spoiler you see a black strip of something flexible flying up, followed by blue smoke out of the back of the car. You can clearly see the timing block at least a foot away from the car. If the LR tire blew, the RR would instantly have more traction, causing the car to veer to the right. Malfunction of the tire, followed by chassis malfunction. Not NHRA's fault.

[tomp64]

Your "deadly" timing blocks don't seem to damage any of the cars in the video. The video also shows the block going behind Force's car into the guardwall. Other videos of that incident show the timing blocks sitting on the track after the crash.

[AntiSemantic1]

@MrFrontenginedragste Thank for clearing that up!