Anyone else see the F1 yesterday? I don't normally bother, but Mrs T is a bit of a fan, so I got a subscription to Sky's sport package for a couple of months, for the last few races of the season. I'd stepped out of the room for a few seconds, and when I got back a red flag had just gone up. I asked why, and they immediately replayed what had happened. For anyone who doesn't bother with F1 at all, a halo device was added to the cars a few years back - it is a titanium barrier which protects the head without having to enclose the driver in a canopy. Many were opposed to it until they saw demonstrations of how it could protect them, including Romain Grosjean. Yesterday he found out how useful it is, and freely admits that he was wrong. The car ploughed through the barriers around the circuit, splitting the car in half. If not for the halo, his head would have come off. He came away with some burns to his hands. The medical crew and stewards were fearles in helping him out of an inferno which he was stuck in for more than 20 seconds. A 53G crash and no fractures...and he kept his head. https://www.skysports.com/f1/news/1...escape-from-fireball-haas-crash-at-bahrain-gp
If it weren't for the halo, he would be wearing a halo. I was listening to the commentary of the race, and the crash was up on YouTube within minutes. How the hell he walked away from that, after nearly 30 seconds in the cockpit, god knows.
But for the result, that could have been straight out of the 1960s - 1970s - Jo Siffert, Piers Courage (in particular), and Roger Williamson come to mind. It made Lauda's accident look like a barbie in the park. That says a huge amount for the advances in technology.
A couple of miles down the road from me is a company that makes specialist seats, perhaps they could diversify into racing car seats.
I came across it on the BBC news website last night & watched the abridged race highlights on YouTube afterwards. (First time I've watched F1 highlights in years). An unbelievable crash especially as he seems to have got out of it relatively unharmed. It looked like life changing industries was the best that could be hoped for, till we saw him with his helmet off, even without realizing he'd gone right through the crash barrier.
I'm pretty certain that Martin Baker was the first company in the world to manufacture specialised one-off components which were then used in finished units with an almost completely computer-controlled production line.
I was at Zandvoort when Roger Williamson died. If I remember correctly his death was the final straw that lead the drivers to demand that safety was made a higher priority.
I read about helicopter ejection seats several years ago - they seriously did consider them! One idea was to fire the seat forward but by the time they'd added all the fittings to swing the control console out of the way and detach the front of the fuselage, the helicopter had no lift capacity for its payload! Another idea was to eject downwards as on some fast jets in the 1950s. Then someone pointed out that helicopters spend much of their working life close to the ground... The Rusian KA-50 does have an ejection seat system that blows off the rotors before the seat fires: Kamov Ka-50 - Wikipedia but I think you'd have to be pretty desperate before you'd deploy it!
That was the figure quoted to the BBC. Coming to a full stop from such high speeds will generate some serious g force https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/formula1/55124967
I suspect the driver was subjected to a somewhat lower acceleration, he remained conscious after all.
