On April 24th, 1962, Stirling Moss entered a minor Formula 1 race known as the Glover Trophy at the Goodwood track in West Sussex. He danced at a country dancehall until 2 a.m. the night before, then rose, apparently unaffected, and prepares his pale green Lotus. On the eighth lap he pulled into the pits with a jammed gearbox. By the time mechanics fixed it he had dropped to 17th place. "What are you goign to do?" a friend asked. "Have a bloody go," Moss answered. In his determination to make up time he flew down straights at 180 m.p.h. and hurtled into corners at 75 m.p.h.--dangerously close to the limit." He's pushing it," a mechanic said. On the 35th lap Moss neared a twisty right-then-left turn called St. Mary's Corner at 110 m.p.h. when his car unaccountably veered off the road, streaked across 150 yards of lawn and smacked into an eight food embankment. It took mechanics half an hour to saw through the crumpled aluminum and remove his limp and unconscious body. A nurse held his hand much of the time. Blood smeared his face and dripped onto his white coveralls. His right cheek was torn open and and his left eye socket was shattered. The crumpled steering wheel had broken two ribs. X-rays revealed severe bruising on the right side of his brain. He lay in a coma for a month, his left side partially paralyzed.
I find it fascinating that although Moss's career was ended by this crash, he never really took up the safety crusade that other drivers, most notably Jackie Stewart, spearheaded later in the decade. To this day, Moss seems to have nostalgia for a time in which drivers put their life on the line when they stepped into a car. He is truly a man from another era, and is such a hero of mine. He won 40% of the races he ever entered and is surely the greatest driver never to win the F1 Championship. His survival and recovery from this accident are a testament to his incredible physical constitution. Even today in his early 80s Moss survived and recovered from a recent 3-story fall in his home elevator shaft that would have killed or severely handicapped most people, let alone most 81-year-olds!
ReplyDeleteautomobiliac: in the course of my research I've run across countless quotes in which Moss argues that danger is what distinguished the sport. Of course he's not necessarily advocating for danger and accidents, but it is clear that he believes that made the sport unique and set the drivers apart from other athletes.
ReplyDeleteRead Ken Purdy's "All But My Life," written based on interviews with Moss during his recovery from the Goodwood crash, for Moss' views on safety. IIRC, one of his quotes was something like: "If some bloke wants to buy a ticket to a motor race, and chooses to stand at a dangerous point on the trackside, and I've entered and am running in that race, get it all wrong near where the bloke is standing, and roll myself, my car, and the spectator all up in a ball, we ALL made choices to be where we were, and it's not a matter for courts, or legislative bodies, or the FIA, or CSI. We all know the dangers inherent in what we're doing, and by me driving, and the spectator buying his ticket and choosing to stand where he did, we presumably have acknowledged that motor racing is a very dangerous sport, and we've weighed the risks, and taken them."
ReplyDeleteI find it quite extraordinary that Mr Cannell, in thirty words, has expressed two inaccuracies about the Moss Accident at Goodwood in 1962. First of all, the shunt happened on April 23 and he certainly did not dance the night away before a race, let alone at a country dance hall and he did not go to bed after 2 a.m. I know what happened as I was there, along with a journalist from TIME magazine and his wife.
ReplyDeleteTo put a couple of names to unknown medical team who were at the rescue.
ReplyDeleteThe nurse referred to holding the hand of Sir Sterling Moss, is Anne Strudwick (Annie) along with her husband Jim Strudwick,(seen in many photo's with his back to camera), But they were only a part of the medical team involved in the rescue and recovery of Sir Sterling Moss.