

How hard was Felipe Massa hit, exactly? - karzeem
http://www.f1fanatic.co.uk/2009/07/28/how-hard-was-massa-hit/

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ars
These calculation are correct, but the wrong ones to use.

It's not energy that causes injuries, it's force. But force is much much more
difficult to calculate. You need to know the area of the impact, and even
harder is calculating how long the deceleration takes.

The helmet spreads out the area so that it's basically half of the entire head
(instead of a small area). The foam inside spreads out the deceleration time.
The nature of a spring would also slow down (i.e. increase) the deceleration
time.

If he body moved backward as it got hit, that too would spread out the
deceleration (i.e. move it from his head/brain, into his entire body).

~~~
karzeem
There are a whole bunch of tough-to-avoid assumptions which make the 2046
joules likely to be imprecise. And in any case, as you say, force is
ultimately the relevant issue. The article is meant more to put the impact
into perspective by comparing it with familiar projectiles, and not so much as
an objective modeling of the impact.

Edit: by way of full disclosure, I wrote the article.

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gacek
I really like the conclusion, about not waiting for a death to realize what
can happen.

The thing is that it is not the open cockpit that can kill, it is the speed.
And the speed is why this sport has so many fans.

Also remember that apart from being hit in his head Massa also hit a wall of
tires at 200+ kph. I know they were there to absorb the shock, still, try
doing that in a regular car...

~~~
baha_man
"...Massa also hit a wall of tires at 200+ kph. I know they were there to
absorb the shock, still, try doing that in a regular car..."

Is a Formula 1 car any better in an impact than a modern car with, say, 5 Euro
NCAP stars[1]? I had a quick Google and it seems that the most important
safety feature in this situation is the head and neck support system:

"The leading causes of death in auto racing accidents are skull and neck
fractures resulting from rapid deceleration during accidents. The Head and
Neck Support system (HANS) was designed to reduce these whiplash effects. The
system consists of a collar that is attached to the safety belt and strapped
to the helmet to hold the helmet in place during an accident. HANS usage
became mandatory in Formula One racing in 2003." [2]

[1] <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_NCAP>

[2]
[http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_three_main_safety_fea...](http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_are_the_three_main_safety_features_of_an_F1_car)

~~~
tetha
You should look up the monocoque F1-cars use. They basically are a carbon case
just around the driver which is designed to hodl of ridiculous forces from
just about any direction. One can go as far as saying: there is pretty much no
chance in hell that a F1-driver is somewhat crushed inside this monocoque. So,
the F1-cars are damn secure, and I do mean damn secure and while it is true
that there are some fairly ugly accidents out there in the F1-world, one has
to keep in mind: that is a car travelling at 200+kph and hits a wall. In about
any other car, the driver would be dead. So, keep in mind: security in F1 is
something else (Survive!) as security in regular street cars (get out of there
without injuries).

cp eg here:
[http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/understanding_the_sport/52...](http://www.formula1.com/inside_f1/understanding_the_sport/5286.html)

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TrevorJ
What was ignored here is that springs are specifically designed to absorb
kinetic energy, or more specifically, the spring would tend to spread the
energy of the impact out over a longer period of time due to compression.
(Much like the tyre wall that Masa slammed into seconds later).

This would obviously depend a lot on the orientation of the spring when it
impacted the helmet, but there's a good possibility that the outcome would
have been very different if he'd been hit by an object of similar mass but
different geometry.

That isn't to say the impact wasn't incredible and horrific. I'm very glad
that he appears to be recovering well.

~~~
ynniv
... and also that the spring was not motionless at the time of impact. If you
can find the video, it turns out that the car that lost the spring isn't even
in sight, so the spring has had some time to decelerate. Still, it is clearly
still moving (bouncing). To calculate the impact energy, you need to know the
relative velocity between the spring and Massa. Also, once the back of his
helmet hit the headrest, the helmet would absorb energy until it cracked,
which it appeared it did not.

My guess is that more damage was done by the head-on collision with the wall
than by the errant spring. These cars have cockpits specifically designed for
safety, but without an airbag there isn't much to help the driver in a head on
collision with no deflection. The tire wall seems to have absorbed a lot of
the energy, but as the car actually penetrated the wall it may have defeated
the primary head on collision safety feature, the crumple zone.

~~~
akronim
> My guess is that more damage was done by the head-on collision with the wall
> than by the errant spring

Given that the medical treatment Massa has received all seems to relate to
head/eye trauma I think it's pretty safe to say it's the spring that did the
damage. Kovalainen's impact into the tires last year was similar and he pretty
much walked away from that.

> but without an airbag there isn't much to help the driver in a head on
> collision with no deflection

That's specifically what the HANS device is for, it's a huge amount of help in
that situation.

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shimi
I haven't lost a race in the last 6 years and I must say this is freakiest
accident I've seen by far.

Ruben's lost a spring on his car, and it ended up in Massa's helmet. What the
chances of that?

The injury was due to the spring (although the crash didn't help)

If anyone wants to see a demonstration of how F1 car is safe have a look at
this: <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MZqBbLyp6oo> Kubica was pretty much on
his legs the same day.

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Devilboy
Here's a pic showing the damage to Massa's helmet and eye
[http://static1.buenosairesherald.com/media/news/images/desta...](http://static1.buenosairesherald.com/media/news/images/destacada/4361_MAssa.jpg)

The teams are all very concerned about safety and I expect much stronger
helmets and visors in the near future. The fact that he walked away without
any broken bones is a testament to the excellent quality of modern F1 safety
cells protecting the drivers. Unfortunately this accident could still be the
end of Massa's career due to the damage to his eye socket.

