Life flashed before eyes

ALL SMILES NOW: Motorsport enthusiasts John Hare (left) and Maurice Hall manage to smile on Monday morning as they spot themselves in newspaper coverage of Saturday’s horrific crash at Pukekohe Race Track. 115061AD

By Dean Taylor

There are signs at the entrances to Pukekohe Race Track warning spectators they are entering a motorsport area which can be dangerous.

On the final two days of the New Zealand round of the V8 Supercars meeting, the truth of those words rang true.

Te Awamutu motor enthusiasts John Hare and Maurice Hall say their lives flashed before their eyes when an out of control race car flew at them on Saturday.

They were in the safest seats at Pukekohe on day two of the New Zealand leg of the V8 Supercar series, or so they thought. In a matter of seconds in the Porsche GT3 event, Aucklander Dean Fulford crashed with another vehicle at over 160km/h on the start/finish straight, rolled, and then flew - clearing a 3.5 metre high safety fence and landing in the lower stand.

Mr Hare says as the car lost control, he had no thought of being unsafe, but then it started to fly - upside-down and backwards. It sat on top of the fence for a split second, then fell. The nose crashed into the first row of seating, just two rows right in front of them.

Mr Hare was hit in the back by a large hunk of flying rubber as he turned and dropped.

“I ended up on top of Maurice and could see others around me lying on the ground between the seats,” says Mr Hare. “A woman nearby had a piece of metal stuck in her leg. Lots of people were sprayed with fuel and oil, but luckily not us.”

The men were amazed how quickly people in the front row had managed to get out of the way of the one-tonne race car so that no-one was seriously injured. Mr Hall says it was like being in a hurricane - all this debris just flew at them in a split second.

“We had nowhere to go,” he says. “I honestly thought the car was going to land on us.”

Getting out was also scary. Mr Hare says people at the back of the stand all wanted to have a look, and police had to be pretty firm about moving them on.

“We were stuck by the wreckage with fuel and oil everywhere, so we were a bit worried about what might happen next,” he says.

They went to the recovery area after the stand was evacuated and watched the rest of the day’s racing from ‘the hill’, but admit to being pretty shaken all day. When one of the race cars backfired, Mr Hall said he thought he had been shot.

And it’s not like the two are not used to it. Mr Hare has raced cars, and crashed them, and both attend lots of events, including V8 Supercar meetings at Bathurst and Eastern Creek in Australia.

They admit going straight to ‘the club’ when they got back to Te Awamutu and having ‘a couple’ to steady their nerves.

The seats had been purchased by Mr Hare’s boss, TML owner Stu Tervit, who went to Sunday’s final day with a few mates. They sat back in the stand, now known as ‘the suicide seats’ believing lightning wouldn’t strike twice. It didn’t, but track safety is under scrutiny following Saturday’s crash and another on Sunday.

Australian photographer Scott Wensley suffered a broken leg after he was hit by flying debris caused by John Bowe’s spectacular high speed crash at the end of the start/finish straight.

Mr Hare and Mr Hall are philosophical now, and say its all part of the spectacle of motor racing - and they will be back next year.

THE HORROR as Dean Fulford’s Porsche GT3 hits the top of the safety fence (left) and the scene as Police move people away from the rescue area while St John staff check the driver. Photos supplied.