[jdm]

ping.

[Names Ash Housewares]

Ricers and gangs ruined the scene utterly.

No common sense anymore.

[Dengar01]

I saw this on the news this deserves a darwin award.

[rom]

Street Racing is stupid. And I have little sympathy for the spectators. They know that they are participating in a highly illegal ‘sport’.

That said, it is getting fairly hard to find a decent drag strip without driving almost 100 miles from where I live.

I still haven’t had the chance to take my Saleen Supercharged Mustang GT out to the strip and see what she will run. I keep meaning to, but the long haul and the amount of work I have has kept me away.

Hopefully within the next year I’ll get to go.

[Tolerance Sucks Rocks]

Maryland “Freak State” PING!

[getarope]

It didn’t help matters any when “The Fast & the Furious” was released in theatres. They should have known that this movie was going to encourage illegal street racing.

[dalereed]

In the 50s I street raced every night of the week.

Sunday was for drag racing at the strip or running at the SCTA meet at El Mirage.

[TNdandelion]

Playing in the street is never a good idea.

[Sir Francis Dashwood]

Drag racing is for those who cannot drive...

[Clemenza]

I seem to remember several young men getting killed dragging on the Parkway when I was a kid. It was stupid then, and is stupid now.

[exit82]

What amazed me was that they could get 50 people to watch a race at 3:40 am.

They quoted a witness who was a woman 27 years old. She got her FOUR year old son out of the way of the errant car, but her father next to her was killed.

What mother brings her 4 year old out at 3:40 am in February to watch a road race?

I didn’t think I could witness more massive stupidity. We can hold the Annual Darwin Awards right now.

[RDTF]

Thanks for the ping

Really makes you stop and say ‘what were they thinking?”

[Othniel]

We had a former Marine who was driving from town out to his folks' place in the country. He'd had a couple of beers, but was careful to take backroads. He came up on a crowd of people that were street racing. He swerved to avoid the cars and the crowd, but hit one or two onlookers. He was nailed for DWI, discharged from the service, and went to jail for a couple of years. He could drive that route home in his sleep, but the unfortunate meeting with idiot racers wrecked his life.

I'm sure that movie "Speed Racer" that is coming out soon will really help street racers says NO. (/sarc off)

[vietvet67]

Believe there’s a drag strip in the area these people were racing.

Remember investigating an insurance claim many years ago in that area where cars were drag racing on highway at night. One fella decided to stand on center line at finish.

He was hit at 120mph and shoes were left upright where he was standing.

[Alberta's Child]

Based on the information I've seen about this story, it seems as if the "drag racing" element of the incident has been a bit overblown.

When I first heard this story, it was presented in such a way that it sounded as if two cars were drag racing on a road somewhere in the wee hours of the morning -- and one or both of them lost control and stuck a crowd of spectators.

However, it looks like neither of the drag-racing cars was involved in this incident. The two cars took off from the starting line, a bunch of spectators ran out into the road to watch them, and then another car -- completely unrelated to the race -- came up and plowed into them (apparently the driver couldn't see them because of the smoke lingering in the air). This seems more like a case of abject stupidity on the part of a large number of pedestrians than anything else.

[ridesthemiles]

At least this post got it right-—It is STREET racing—NOT DRAG racing. Yes, to those who don’t quite know better, some think it is the same. It is not. It is illegal racing on the street that created this mess. Movies like the Fast and the Furious and Drifting don’t help at all.

I was sorely disappointed in ABC this morning. The constantly referred to the incident as drag racing, and all the graphics and titles said drag racing.

Since ABC Wide World of Sports was the first network to even televise DRAG racing, I felt they were very disrespectful. Long before we had 783 channels to fill up every day, ABC and Keith Jackson were showing the real—PROFESSION— entertainment that drag racing involves.

Thousands of people have their jobs- directly and indirectly owned to drag racing and racing in general. Better and better products including safety items are a direct result of this sport.

OTOH, I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that ABC would be so dismissive of a sport with high economic impact. They constantly refer to President G W Bush on all their “news” shows as MR BUSH. That, also, is completely disrespectful.

[robertpaulsen]

"I feel more sympathy for the driver of the sedan and his deceased passenger"

How do I put this delicately? The passenger wasn't a passenger until after the accident.

[D Rider]

All across the country, race tracks open to the public have been shut down, due to noise, crowds, safety... etc. Now people are racing in the streets. Go figure.

[G Larry]

>Based on the preliminary report, I feel more sympathy for the driver of the sedan and his deceased passenger than I do for the pedestrian victims.<

Did you notice the part where this idiot was driving WITH ONLY HIS PARKING LIGHTS ON IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT?

[Senator Goldwater]

The idiots who were struck were gathered in the middle of a two lane highway in the middle of the night.

Yet here in Maryland, the survivors families will clean up civilly in front of PG jurors.