Quote:
Originally Posted by Jim Craik
Yes, I also remember the fire, Race# 4 (00-002) was credited with only eight laps, so it was very early in the race. On YouTube there is a Japanese vidio showing the efforts to extinguish the car, its kind of painful to watch.....
But then again, an undamaged, complete car would be out of my price range....
As I understand the story, a few years ago, this chassis was sold to a guy in Western Australia who planned to modify it into a track car with a Viper V10. His plans changed and fortunately no mods were carried out.
He mentioned in the GT40s.com web site this is was available and I was able to convince the wife that we needed this very beautiful and fairly significant car.
I do plan/hope to return this beauty to a runner/historic racer and have started the process. That said, it's going to be a fairly slow process as I really enjoy being married  |
To be fair the car was crashed into the pit wall in the warm up session, just a couple of hours before the start of the race and with the mechanics managing to rebuild it so quickly it could take the start, it was suspected something was not attached or fixed properly, causing an oil line to burst or come apart and set the car on fire. It stopped just after the second chicane on the Mulsanne straight, drivers right at marshals post 63 who tried to put the fire out. Problem was the electrics were still on leaving the fuel pump to do it's job - and with the car rapidly being engulfed with flames there was hardly a chance for the marshals to get close to the car and put it out - one even tried to 'smack off' the kill switch with his knife - which broke the blade! At least the driver made it out safely (young Kristian Kolby if I am correct).
Must have been 15-20 minutes or so into the race, causing the Safety Car to make an early appearance and showing again the fragility of the Caddilacs as the undertray of one of the SC's came off and went for a flight - again! (the scene already being witnessed earlier in the week when they made several showings before and between practice sessions).
