Worst F1 Crash

**CCFanatic** · 18th December 2007, 00:17

I am young, and I though Kubica's crash was just scary. Verstappen at Monza. Schumacher's leg breaking crash. Ralf's crash at Indy.

**FIA** · 18th December 2007, 19:34

Originally Posted by Kevincal

Sorry, but I forget the racers name. The worst F1 crash I have heard of is the beheading of a driver who went through the bottom portion of a guardrail, while the top stayed intact...

That was Helmut(h) Koeinigg at Watkins Glen 1974

**Bagwan** · 18th December 2007, 19:55

The worst crash of all is in McLaren stocks right now .

**AAReagles** · 26th December 2007, 20:08

Originally Posted by Bagwan

The worst crash of all is in McLaren stocks right now .

**SGWilko** · 26th December 2007, 20:28

I recall two startline pileups in particular.

One was (I think) in Austria in the 80's (6 or 7 maybe), one caused by mansell's slipping clutch, and another stack at the restart.....

The other one was Spa in mid to late 90's, when half the field crashed, possibly as a result of a coming together with Coulthard and another?

No serious injuries, probably some hurt pride though....

**Bezza** · 31st December 2007, 12:38

I've been watching F1 since 1993 and I was only 8 years old so it is hard for me to judge overall on earlier accidents as the ones I've seen are all in retrospect. There is nothing more frightening than seeing a crash live and the driver not immediately getting out. With that in mind I am lucky in that only once - Senna - has the worse happened. I missed Greg Moore's crash even though at the time I was a big follower of CART. The worst accident I've seen then is Luciano Burti's at Spa in 2001. - he went straight on into the tyre-wall at 190mph and the car just stuck there. He was very lucky to survive.

Accidents are part of racing and whatever you say, do add to the excitement - maybe not for all of us, but for the majority of the casual fans - as long as the driver walks away. I am excited by a big accident when the driver gets out and waves to the crowd - you think to yourself "wow! that was huge!" but the guy just gets out and walks out and so you credit the safety of F1 that a crash like that can happen without casualty. If accidents were impossible then barely anyone would watch F1, because the unpredictability would be taken out altogether.

**L-P_qwerty** · 24th February 2008, 17:46

I did a 10 minute long video of Formula 1 crashes, its from 70's and 80's and doesn't include fatal accidents. Check it out. http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=UkqY4YZVlCY

**call_me_andrew** · 25th February 2008, 06:49

I think ESPN produces an annual special called "Thrills and Spills". They always make it a point to mention that all the drivers were able to recover from their accidents and return to racing.

I was going through some old Indy 500 videos on Youtube the other day and I found one of Gordon Smiley's crash in 1982. That scared the crap out of me.

I caught Grand Prix on TV the other day and I realized that you couldn't make a movie like that today. Not just because of logistics, but because racing is so much safer than it used to be.

Someone on the forums once remarked, "I remember when sex was safe and racing was dangerous."

**woody2goody** · 25th February 2008, 21:04

Being under 20 years old, I don't remember seeing any fatal crashes on the TV. But I used to, and very occasionally still do, have a dream about a helicopter flying away from the Imola circuit.

I didn't follow F1 back then as I was only 5, but that one image has been plain as day to me for nearly 14 years. When I saw the video of THAT race, the images were eerily accurate.

I have looked at fatal crashes on the aforementioned websites, but this is because I am interested in the history of motor racing. And when you know that so-and-so racing legend died in a crash, it makes you want to know what happened so you can piece together the puzzle that is F1.

I was shocked to my core for a good hour or so when Kubica crashed in Canada last year. It has to be the worst crash I've ever seen in F1, but others spring to mind - '98 spa pile up, Burti 2001 - GER, BEL. Raikkonen at Hockenheim when his rear wing failed was pretty bad.

The ones that we are very lucky to say didn't turn out fatal were DC-Wurz '07, Heidfeld-Sato '02 and possibly even Ralf's back-breaker at Indianapolis. This shows just how safe our sport has become, but at the same time how dangerous it remains.

**Tazio** · 4th March 2008, 09:05

Nice bit (horrifying actually) on the incident, the man, and the brave drivers that saved his life!
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/spo...cle3466290.ece
His decision to retire amid the blind chaos at Fuji on October 24, thus handing the world championship to Hunt by a point, was the logical thing to do for a man who had stared into an abyss that many of his fellow drivers had been spared! As he took his helmet off there ahead of time, Niki made the pivotal announcement of his career. “There are more important things in life than the world championship, like staying alive.”

There was nobody else in the world who knew that better than he did. And that one rare day of defeat did not stop him coming back to win time and again.