Is the catch-fence enough to keep race fans safe?

Saturday, Jul. 04, 2009

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. - A few hardy fans leaned up against the fence at Daytona International Speedway as raindrops fell sporadically during what should have been NASCAR Sprint Cup qualifying.

There were no cars on the track, so security didn't shoo them away from the fence meant to protect them from the action.

Some stood on the white concrete base, which rose about two feet up from the walkway in front of the grandstands, and leaned against the steel fence. They took photographs of the cars parked on pit road, covered as they waited in the rain. Some just peered out to get a closer look than they usually can.

Less than three months ago, a similar fence became the subject of discussions about fan safety at superspeedways. On the final lap of the Aaron's 499 at Talladega Superspeedway on April 26, an accident sent Carl Edwards' car into the catch-fence, which bowed but didn't break.

"You could clearly see that that was a devastating incident that looked like it had debris into the seating area and, yeah, I was terrified," DIS President Robin Braig said. "That reaction only lasts as long as you find out that everyone is safe, that everything worked, that there were no serious injuries, and then I regained my confidence in NASCAR and our systems that we have in place."

The competitors were safe and most fans were, too. But debris from Edwards' car went into the grandstands, injuring eight people. One woman, who suffered the most severe injury, broke her jaw.

In Saturday's Coke Zero 400, NASCAR's Sprint Cup Series makes its first return to a restrictor-plate superspeedway since that dramatic crash. Daytona International Speedway and Talladega Superspeedway are the only restrictor-plate tracks on NASCAR's circuit and both are known for high speeds and massive wrecks.

International Speedway Corp., which owns both superspeedways, has not yet determined changes should be made to either track. NASCAR has made no changes to the car to keep it from going airborne, nor the rules to keep such wrecks from happening.

"It's relatively the same type of package (at Daytona and Talladega) where you're running the same amount of speed," said Ryan Newman. " . . . Yeah, I wish there would have been some changes or some developments technology-wise with the roof flaps and keeping the cars down, but I haven't heard anything and I haven't been told anything."

The truth is, it's unclear yet what kinds of changes, if any, could have prevented Edwards' particular situation. Neither are they sure changes to the track could keep fans safer.

"The fence has been a subject of many revisions over the decades and the fence did its job," said Jack Roush, who owns Edwards' team. "The person injured was regrettable but was relatively minor, and so the car of tomorrow didn't come apart . . . Carl's car did what it needed to do to protect him, the way he was anchored in the seat. The fence did what it needed to do to protect the fans.

"Now, would we like to have a greater margin of safety? Absolutely."

Under review

As he battled for the lead at the Alabama track, Edwards made a blocking move as he raced against rookie Brad Keselowski that went horribly awry. Unwilling to go below the yellow out-of-bounds line and lose the race, Keselowski stayed straight. Edwards then spun around after some contact and his car began to lift in the air.

Roof flaps deployed to stop the upward motion, but before they could do their job, Newman smacked into Edwards, punting him skyward. The accident happened in Talladega's tri-oval, and Edwards hit the fence, sending debris flying.

He got out of the car and said drivers would race that way at Talladega until "somebody gets killed."

Immediately after April's race, Talladega President Rick Humphrey said the speedway would assess the fence's height to see if it needed to increase. The track is still examining that and other factors.

Talladega's fence is 14 feet from the track surface. That's a foot shorter than the fence at Lowe's Motor Speedway, where three spectators were killed when debris flew into the grandstand in a 1999 IndyCar race.

International Speedway Corp. did not disclose the height of the fence at DIS citing "company policy," but the Sentinel measured the fence near the end of the tri-oval as close to 10 feet from the top of the fence to the concrete wall. That wall then extends onto the track.

Speedway spokesman Lenny Santiago said Talladega released its fence height because that track had an incident that made the fence relevant. He said if there was such an incident at Daytona, the company would consider releasing that information.

Santiago said Daytona's fence was closer to Talladega's than any other track.

"We're hopeful nothing ever happens at our facility," Santiago said. " . . . We are fully confident that the fencing is safe. It'll be safe for our fans. Its integrity is checked all the time and we have no concerns at Daytona for this weekend."

There weren't concerns about Talladega, either, before that race, though a car going into the catchfence isn't new at that track. In 1987, Bobby Allison's car had a similar wreck and actually tore the fence.

Because of its history of spectacular wrecks, Dale Earnhardt Jr. wondered why people were so surprised. He said that kind of accident was just a matter of time. A few weeks later Newman told the Sentinel cars can go airborne at any track where speeds approach 200 miles per hour. Although restrictor plates reduced speeds at both Daytona and Talladega, they also caused cars to bunch together, thus exacerbating the effect of wrecks.

With cars so close together, the probability of a car being hit twice in one crash is high. The consensus reached about Edwards' car was that had Newman not hit it, it would not have gone into the fence.

"In this situation I don't think anything can be done here," said Hany Nakhla, an engineering professor at Embry-Riddle University. "You can't prevent something like that from happening in certain situations."

NASCAR officials and Roush Fenway Racing officials agreed with that assessment, saying in certain cases, cars will go airborne.

Protecting fans

The task then turns to what can be done to prevent those cars from getting dangerously close to fans.

Some have suggested moving back the closest seats. Humphrey said the problem with that move is nobody knows how far is far back enough. The track can't foresee every situation.

At Daytona International Speedway, the Sentinel measured the first row of seats near the end of the tri-oval as about 19 feet from the fence. Each row is a few feet farther back.

Roush saw a different problem. To him, the position of the start-finish line is the real issue.

Talladega's start-finish line is at the end of the tri-oval, while Daytona's is right in the center. Because of that, the aggressive moves by the drivers at the front of the pack happened in the tri-oval at Talladega instead of before it, and as the track curved, Edwards' airborne car didn't curve with it.

"If you move the start-finish line ... you would've had that in Turn 4 and the car would've gone airborne in a straight area of the race track and wouldn't have gone into the fence," Roush said. "... Certainly it's my interest to see the start-finish line at Talladega be moved back to the center of the tri-oval there."

Edwards wasn't the only Roush Fenway driver who went upside-down at Talladega. His teammate, Matt Kenseth, did, too. While it was Kenseth's first time flipping, he knows drivers assume certain risks when they race.

And with no real answers about how to prevent cars from going airborne, hitting the fence and releasing debris into the grandstands, fans who sit close to the track to experience the excitement, do, too.

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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