Accident at the Le Mans 24-hour race in 1955

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The accident at the 24-hour race at Le Mans in 1955 on June 11, 1955 is regarded as the worst disaster in motorsport to date. As a result of a collision between the French Pierre Levegh and the British Lance Macklin's car , 84 people died.

To the prehistory

Pierre Levegh was hired as a works driver by the Mercedes motorsport department in early 1955 . One of the reasons for Levegh's commitment was the determination he showed in the 1952 Le Mans race . Although a second driver was available at the time, Levegh did not take the time to change drivers, but drove 23 hours straight. Due to an engine failure 70 minutes before the end of the race, Levegh lost the lead and had to retire.

Levegh started in Le Mans instead of the actually seeded Hans Herrmann , who had suffered serious injuries during training for the Monaco Grand Prix in 1955 and was therefore unable to compete in Le Mans. He was in the hospital and watched the race on TV.

Mercedes introduced Levegh the new sports car Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR available with which it in the third World Cup sports cars of the FIA debuted 1955th

The 300 SLR had a tubular space frame and a body made from the electron magnesium alloy . However, unlike its competitor Jaguar D-Type , the car had drum brakes rather than disc brakes . To compensate for this shortcoming and to increase the braking effect, the Mercedes was equipped with an air brake (similar to the function of the spoiler on an airplane): a flap behind the driver could be manually placed vertically in the airstream when braking and caused more traction and the generated Air vortex a certain delay.

At that time, security was rather secondary. Seat belts did not yet exist, the racetrack was a simple country road outside of the race and, in terms of safety, has not been adapted to the ever increasing speeds of the racing cars since the 1920s, which are now around 300 km / h compared to just under 100 km / h at the time to lead. Wooden fences and straw bales were used to protect spectators and racing drivers.

The race was unusually well attended; it is said to have gathered around 300,000 spectators. The main stand opposite the boxes was crowded; Spectators stood on ladders and covered boards.

the accident

Graphic of the accident of 1955: (26-blue) Lance Macklin (Austin-Healey 100) was overtaken by (6-green) Mike Hawthorn (Jaguar), who cuts in in front of (26-blue) Macklin and brakes sharply to get into the Pit lane to come. (26-blue) Macklin has to swerve to the left, where (20-gray) Pierre Levegh (Mercedes) approaches with approx. 240 km / h (see running text). (19-gray) Juan Manuel Fangio (Mercedes), who also drives at approx. 240 km / h, is warned by a hand signal from his team mate Levegh and can avoid Macklin's badly damaged Austin unscathed. The whole accident lasted 4 seconds.

Pierre Levegh (Mercedes) with starting number 20 started the race. His partner was the American John Fitch , who would later replace him. In addition to Mercedes and Jaguar, the favorites for the race were the cars of Ferrari , Aston Martin and Maserati .

The battles for positions began in the early stages of the race. At 6:26 p.m., almost two hours after the start of the race, the 35th lap was almost over. Mike Hawthorn led the field with his Jaguar just ahead of Juan Manuel Fangio in the Mercedes. In between drove the already lapped Pierre Levegh. Before Hawthorn lay the Briton Lance Macklin in his Austin-Healey 100 . Hawthorn lapped the slower Englishman and cut in just before Macklin to make a scheduled stop at the pits. At that time, the pit lane was not structurally separated from the track, the vehicles stopped immediately on the right-hand edge of the straight. The Jaguar's disc brakes slowed the car faster than the Austin-Healey's drum brakes . To avoid the now slowing Jaguar Hawthorns, Macklin had to turn left out of lane. But he did not see that Levegh (who was sixth at the time) and his teammate Fangio were approaching from behind. In almost all publications dealing with the accident in this race, the unfortunate maneuver of Hawthorn is presented as the cause of the accident. Why the Englishman first overtook Macklin and then immediately braked hard to head for the pit is still unclear today. He never gave any information about it himself.

Levegh, even before Fangio, barely had time to react. At full speed the Mercedes hit the slower Austin Macklins at the rear. For aerodynamic reasons, the body of the Austin was designed sloping backwards, which now looked like a ramp. Levegh's Mercedes started up and took off. The Mercedes got a left twist, which threw it onto an earth wall that had been built to protect the spectators.

The Mercedes hit the mound and the car rolled over. Wreckage was thrown further in the direction of travel, including the bonnet and the front axle, which flew through the spectators in the main stand. The engine block broke through the chassis and was also thrown into the crowd. Levegh fell out of the car when it rolled over. The gas tank that was mounted behind the driver's seat burst, the fuel caught fire. This heated the body above the ignition temperature. The magnesium alloy burned with a white flame, the roadway and the spectators were covered with ashes. Helpers tried unsuccessfully to free the burning wreck. Not knowing what the body was made of, they tried to put out the fire with water. These attempts to extinguish the fire made the fire even more violent ( see also: Hazards and protective measures: Magnesium ). The Mercedes burned for several hours. More than 80 spectators died from the swirling wreckage and the fire. Levegh died of serious injuries at the scene of the accident.

Fangio, warned by a hand signal from Levegh, was able to avoid Macklin's badly damaged Austin, which now lurched over the right side of the road. The Austin hit the pit wall, killing three people, and was thrown back onto the road. Not far from the burning Mercedes, the Austin hit the left guardrail, killing another spectator. Macklin survived the accident.

The further race

The race continued despite the accident. The official justification said that they wanted to keep the access roads free for the rescue workers. Hawthorn also continued to participate in the race after his pit stop, although he was the cause of the disaster.

When the Mercedes-Benz headquarters was informed of the number of dead and injured during the night, it was decided to remove the two remaining driver teams (Juan Manuel Fangio / Stirling Moss and Karl Kling / André Simon ) from the race. At the time, Mercedes was leading Jaguar by one lap.

Jaguar left its teams in the race because they did not feel responsible for the accident. Mike Hawthorn won the race along with his team-mate and compatriot Ivor Bueb . Out of respect for the victims, they did not hold a victory celebration. The next day, a funeral service was held for the dead in Le Mans Cathedral .

aftermath

The plaque that commemorates the dead in the accident. It is now installed on the security fence.

In France , Germany , Spain and Switzerland , motorsport events were canceled or banned after the tragedy. In other countries, routes have been rebuilt and safety precautions improved. An official commission of inquiry came to the conclusion that the Jaguar racing team was not responsible for the catastrophe, it was a pure racing accident. The fact that 83 viewers died was due to a lack of safety precautions.

Two more races took place this World Cup season, the International Tourist Trophy in Great Britain and the Targa Florio in Italy , which were held a few months later. Mercedes cars won both races, so Mercedes won the constructors' world championship.

After the last race, Mercedes-Benz initially withdrew from motorsport. It was erroneously assumed that the Le Mans catastrophe was the trigger for this decision, but the board of directors had made the decision to withdraw at the end of the year as early as the spring of 1955, months before the disastrous race.

Prohibition in Switzerland

As a result of the accident, Switzerland issued a ban on circuit racing , which is still in force today. A parliamentary attempt to lift the ban failed in 2009 because the Council of States decided not to take action .

literature

  • Michel Bonté: Le Mans, 11 June 1955 . BA editions, 2004

Movie

  • Guido Knopp : ZDF History: The Le Mans catastrophe. Running to death. Documentation, 2010, 52 min, producer ZDF.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ www.motorsportmemorial.org
  2. ↑ Anno Hecker: Le Mans battlefield. In: FAZ.net . June 14, 2005, accessed May 9, 2020 .
  3. ^ Thomas Ammann , Simone Jost-Westendorf: Apocalypse in Le Mans - The race to death. In: prounenfilm.de . (on ORF III as part of the zeit.geschichte on Saturday: Apocalypse in Le Mans - Race to Death , 2017)