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NHRA Finals plane crash?????

AiiRaciing

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My Dad sent me this right after it happened, luckily all the safety teams were already there to make sure everyone was safe. He said it took seconds for them to get into the crash site
IMG_8642.jpeg
 

AiiRaciing

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It was not Capps family RV, my dad was with John Capps(John, Betty and my Dad park their busses next to each other) and they had just walked from their busses a 1/4 mile away, on the way to the stands they walked where the plane crashed seconds before. When they reached the top of the grand stands they heard the crash. The owner of the truck had just gotten his dog out of the truck
 

wzuber

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I’m gonna remember that trick if the need ever arises. Between the roof collapsing, the suspension loading, air in tires and the truck moving forward about 20’ from where it was impacted a lot of energy was bled off for sure.
Had that not occurred that 5th wheel would have been decimated and would have likely caught fire with the propane reefer and stuff running. Those neighboring buses would have been severely damage too it appears. A lot of angels worked hard to minimize the damage from that scene.
 

SkyDirtWaterguy

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There’s a difference between fuel exhaustion and fuel starvation. That old Cherokee 6 has a fuel selector valve to burn fuel from either the right or left tank. IF the tank he was running on went too low and he forgot to switch tanks it may of caused fuel starvation to the engine before he could get the selector valve switched over. At a low altitude and low engine RPM, possibly not enough fuel pressure to feed the engine on the other tank in time to keep the motor running. Just a guess given preliminary info.
 

coolchange

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That guy was hangin that thing in the air.
I’m sure in his head was, “come on… a couple more feet…” glad everything was best case scenario. Now there’s some explanations due.
 

Sleek-Jet

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There’s a difference between fuel exhaustion and fuel starvation. That old Cherokee 6 has a fuel selector valve to burn fuel from either the right or left tank. IF the tank he was running on went too low and he forgot to switch tanks it may of caused fuel starvation to the engine before he could get the selector valve switched over. At a low altitude and low engine RPM, possibly not enough fuel pressure to feed the engine on the other tank in time to keep the motor running. Just a guess given preliminary info.

The older Cherokee 6's had 4 tanks that you can switch between, I think they were all 20 gallons. Old "6" drivers would caution that you don't end up with your 1 hour reserve spread across 4 tanks (about 3.5 gallons in each). The Saratoga I fly is simplified with 50 gallon of fuel in each wing. There are still 4 tanks but they are interconnected so you simply have left, right and off on the fuel selector.
 

oldboatsrule

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Think they were already there watching the racing before the crash.

Negative. They were rolling as the people were being pulled from the plane. NHRA safety safari was 1st on scene immediately.

People drive past the race track blowing their train horns total LAM style. We heard the fire truck and thought.. " Jesus these guys too ?" Right about then we heard that the plane had crashed.

I've seen alot of things over the years at Pomona. Stood on the starting line and watched the guy go splat parachuting in with the flag, Seen blowovers, many many record runs, watched several legends make their last passes, countless championships crowned. I've seen fights, boobs ,drunks roll down the stands, porti pottys tipped, I've seen funny car bodys land on spectators. standing along the fence. But I never once thought I would see a plane crash and nobody on the ground get killed.

Wally Parks truly does watch over the NHRA.
 

4Waters

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Negative. They were rolling as the people were being pulled from the plane. NHRA safety safari was 1st on scene immediately.

People drive past the race track blowing their train horns total LAM style. We heard the fire truck and thought.. " Jesus these guys too ?" Right about then we heard that the plane had crashed.

I've seen alot of things over the years at Pomona. Stood on the starting line and watched the guy go splat parachuting in with the flag, Seen blowovers, many many record runs, watched several legends make their last passes, countless championships crowned. I've seen fights, boobs ,drunks roll down the stands, porti pottys tipped, I've seen funny car bodys land on spectators. standing along the fence. But I never once thought I would see a plane crash and nobody on the ground get killed.

Wally Parks truly does watch over the NHRA.
They were obviously watching, I've seen them there several times watching in the past
 

bonesfab

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Negative. They were rolling as the people were being pulled from the plane. NHRA safety safari was 1st on scene immediately.

People drive past the race track blowing their train horns total LAM style. We heard the fire truck and thought.. " Jesus these guys too ?" Right about then we heard that the plane had crashed.

I've seen alot of things over the years at Pomona. Stood on the starting line and watched the guy go splat parachuting in with the flag, Seen blowovers, many many record runs, watched several legends make their last passes, countless championships crowned. I've seen fights, boobs ,drunks roll down the stands, porti pottys tipped, I've seen funny car bodys land on spectators. standing along the fence. But I never once thought I would see a plane crash and nobody on the ground get killed.

Wally Parks truly does watch over the NHRA.
I was there for that parachute incident. Pretty messed up that day.
 
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