This Day in History: On this day in 1965, an 8-year-old boy was killed and eight other people injured when a stock car, driven by NASCAR champion Richard Petty, flew off a drag strip and into a crowd of spectators. The accident, which happened at the Southeastern International Dragway in Dallas, Georgia, happened when a tie rod broke on Petty's Plymouth Barracuda dragster while he was moving at 130 miles per hour. Most of the fans were able to get out of the way, but Wayne Dye of Austell died when the car struck him.
A month earlier, another spectator was killed during a race. "During the first lap of the NASCAR Grand National race Motor Trend 500, held at Riverside International Raceway on Sunday, 17 January 1965, the 1962 Pontiac #38 driven by Charles Powell, spun and went off the track, between turns one and two, ending into a dirt embankment on the infield.
In that same place a group of spectators were watching the race, standing on a forklift truck. At the moment of the accident several of them moved to see the spinning car, causing a freak accident. The forklift suddenly lost its balance, slid and rolled down an incline, at least five persons were seriously injured when it toppled over. One of them, Ronald Pickle, 20-year-old from San Diego, California, was killed upon impact, crushed between the truck and a chain link fence which kept the truck from rolling onto the track." Source
No comments:
Post a Comment