Author: Robin

Racing horror crashes

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So, once in a while you come accros a post on social media that talk about so called horror crashes in racing. Usualy those are no horror crashed to me by far. Sure there are some bad ones and if people die then they obviously are horror crashes or just freak accidents. But in the case of a crash where the driver is alive in the end most of them do not qualify as a horror crash to me. There are a few exeptions that come to mind.

 

Romain Grosjean at Bahrain

During the Bahrain Grand Prix in 2020, Romain Grosjean experienced a dramatic crash that led to his car splitting in two and catching fire. The accident occurred when Grosjean’s Haas car collided with a protective barrier at a high speed, resulting in a 53G impact. The force of the collision caused the car to break apart and burst into flames. Remarkably, Grosjean managed to escape from the fiery wreckage with only minor injuries, which was considered a miraculous outcome given the severity of the crash.

Sophia Floersch at Macau

Did not see this one live, but I think I did see it pretty quikly after it happened. The incident occurred when her car collided with another vehicle while approaching the Lisboa bend. This collision caused her car to lose control and become airborne, traveling at an estimated speed of 275 km/h. The car then flew over other competitors and ultimately crashed into the track’s fence and a press box. The impact of the crash resulted in Floersch sustaining a spinal fracture, but she got back in the car after that injury was healed.

Robert Kubica in Canada

During the 27th lap, Kubica’s BMW collided with Jarno Trulli’s Toyota, his car hit a hump in the grass, which caused the nose of the car to lift into the air. This left him unable to brake or steer effectively. As a result, his car crashed into a wall at a speed of approximately 290km/h. Everything flew of the car and the monocoque spun accross the track and did 1 barrel rol and came to a hold on the side of the track. Even though Robert had to sit out the next race at Indianapolis he was back in the car for the next race.

Rubence Barricello at Imola

Barrichello hit a curb at the Variante Bassa corner at a high speed of approximately 225 km/h. This impact launched his car over the curb, causing it to crash into the debris fence where he almost instantly got to a stop. Barrichello was knocked unconscious by the collision and suffered a broken nose. He did not race the rest of that weekend, but got into a car soon after again. This was of course the first major incident that weekend, that gave us 2 actual horror crashes resulting in the deaths of Ayrton Senna and Roland Ratzenberger.

Alex Zanardi in Germany

Not sure you can say this was a good outcome, I mean Alex did loose both legs, but he survived and was back in a car racing. I think this was one of those crashes where any safety measures would not have mattered. He spun of the track and slid back on where he was hit in the side by another car going full speed and that basically ripped of the front af the car, together with Alex’ legs. I can’t see what would have helped him in this case

 

Potential horror crashes

W-series at Spa

During the fifth round of the W Series at Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium, a significant crash occurred involving six drivers. The incident took place at the Eau Rouge corner, a challenging and renowned section of the circuit. The crash involved drivers Sarah Moore, Beitske Visser, Abbie Eaton, Belen Garcia, Ayla Agren, and Fabienne Wohlwend. It happened during a qualifying session, and was severe enough that the session was interrupted. Notably, the crash occurred as rain began to fall on the circuit, adding to the challenge of the already demanding track. Of the six drivers involved, two needed to be taken to the hospital for further assessment due to the magnitude of the crash​.

So nothing to bad and therefor not a horror crash, but more a ‘what could have been’ in this case.

Indy 500 wheel flies off

During the 2023 Indianapolis 500, a dramatic incident occurred involving drivers Felix Rosenqvist and Kyle Kirkwood. With less than 20 laps remaining in the race, Rosenqvist collided with a wall, causing him to lose control and veer onto the track. This led to a subsequent collision with Kirkwood, whose rear left tire was dislodged from his racecar. The dislodged tire then bounced off the track and flew over the fencing, narrowly missing the spectator stands. It ultimately landed on a parked white Chevrolet Cruze in a small parkinglot

So not a big crash itself, drivers got out OK, without any issue, but the fact a tire got loose and by some sort of mirracle went over the grandstands and hit an empty car in the parkinglot is what makes this a potential horror crash

Allen McNish at Le Mans

Not so much the crash itself to be honest, those LMP cars are very strong and Allen got out OK, but in this case so much debris whent into people like photographers standing along the track that made it pretty scarry.

SpaceX starschip SN8 successful test

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Looking at the news here in Holland (nu.nl, nos.nl and even jeugdjournaal on TV) and in the world (CNN for example) they all seem to focus on the failed landing of the Starship SN8 yesterday. I understand why that is because a rocket that blows up make for a good headline, but it was just a very small part of all the tests they did ranging from the liftoff, the transition into the belly flop and getting back in a vertical position just before landing and then the landing itself in the end. But this was a test of a prototype and the first one they ever did, so I’m pretty sure they expected it to have a RUD (rapid unscheduled disassembly) at some point. Elon Musk himself said that getting all of that done in their first try would probably not happen and you could see more stuff that was going wrong for sure.

There was a canceled Starship launch the day before, where it seems one of the engines did not fire, but also during the actual launch it seems 2 out of 3 engines stopped working to soon but engine number 42 kept going and at some point it almost seemed that the rocket was hovering. Then the flappy ‘wings’ made the rocket go horizontal, by moving their angle, which was the plan, and go into a belly flop to slow down de descent without the need for a parachute. This worked very well and with the camera on the rocket you could see the flaps doing small corrections to keep the rocket level.

SpaceX starship doing a belly flop

Then, right before the landing 2 Starship rockets re-ignited (from what I understand it was supposed to be 2) but one stopped again and the other started to burn green fire. There was some fuel pressure issue that caused that. Knowing what fuel pressure issues mean in Formula 1 it might be so that there was not enough fuel left to actual provide that pressure, but that is not confirmed as far as I know.

The landing itself looked OK, the rocket was at the landing pad, vertical and blasting it’s engine at the right moment, but because of the issues it was just coming in to fast and landed a bit to fast, resulting in the explosion, which was pretty cool to see as well as all explosions are of course.

In the end a successful set of Starship tests, where a few components didn’t really go as many expected, but the goal was to learn and that they did I guess. With the next test of SN9 they have a later version of the engines I understand and with the 42 that was the latest one in this rocket that kept going that should work out a bit better and I’m guessing fuel pressure can be fixed for the next one pretty easily (either put in more or fix some valve that was causing the issue?)

So, overall the 2 days of watching a rocket were pretty long days, but I’m happy the have been there to watch if live and see the first belly flop of a rocket ever.

Bahrain, 29-11-2020

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Ik weet niet of het komt omdat je als je inmiddels 40 jaar oud bent je meer over zaken gaat nadenken of dat het gewoon zo’n dag was, maar ik heb gisteren ongeveer 3 kwartier met rillingen over mijn rug voor de TV gezeten.

Ik kijk al zo’n 25 jaar Formule 1 en andere autosport en heb in die tijd best wel het een en ander gezien. Het ongeluk en de dood van Ayrton Senna kan ik me niet herrinneren, of in ieder geval niet live op TV, maar in de tussentijd is er natuurlijk best wel wat gebeurd, zoals Jules Bianchi en Antoin Hubert die zijn overleden maar beide waren voor mij niet live op TV, maar ook een dodelijk ongeluk op Le Mans en diverse motor ongelukken die niet goed zijn afgelopen.

Daarnaast natuurlijk heel veel meer ongelukken maar je weet gewoon de afgelopen jaren dat het goed afloopt, dus dan zijn de grote klappen over het algemeen voornamelijk interessant.

Dit was afgelopen zondag in mijn geval even anders. Ik zat met een zak kruidnoten en een kop koffie te kijken naar de start van de F1 race in Bahrain. Iedereen was een beetje aan het trekken en duwen en er gingen wat vleugels door de lucht en ineens achterin het veld een grote klap, vuur en de camera die er niet meer naar terug ging. Als je dan weet dat dit een regel is in het racen dat er bij een ongeluk niets wordt laten zien totdat duidelijk is of alles OK is, schrik je wel even, zeker omdat vuur op deze manier gewoon niet meer gebeurd de afgelopen 25 jaar.

Mijn kruidnoten en koffie gingen op tafel en ik nam een stuk minder relaxte houding aan met rillingen over mijn rug. Ook Olaf Mol op TV was duidelijk van slag en probeerde dapper te vertellen hoe het met de rest van de coureurs ging. Voor mijn gevoel duurde het heel lang, maar in werkelijkheid denk ik maar een minuut of 2 voordat we eindelijk het beeld zagen van Grosjean veilig in de medical car. Dit waren weer rillingen over mijn rug, maar in dit geval van opluchting.

In de komenden minuten kregen we te zien wat er nou was gebeurd en ook de beelden van wat er over was van de auto en uiteindelijk ook hoe Grosjean zelf uit de auto kwam met het brandende wrak nog om zich heen. Er gaat dan door je heen hoe veilig de sport tegenwoordig is en hoe veel geluk Grosjean heeft gehad, weer rillingen.

Dan ga je zitten nadenken ‘wat als’. Wat als die lelijke Halo er niet op had gezeten, wat als hij buiten westen was geraakt door de klap (ik hoorde 53G), wat als het een ronde later was gebeurd en de medical car er niet meer vlak achter zat etc. etc. rillingen.

Het heeft alles bij elkaar denk ik zo’n beetje 3 kwartier geduurd voordat ik mijn kruidnoten er weer bij pakte en een nieuw kopje koffie ging halen.

Formula 1 2017, now this is going to be interesting

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Old and new drivers

Even though the wait between seasons has been a lot shorter then it was not that long ago I still can’t wait for the new Formula 1 season so start. We have our Max Verstappen in the Red Bull for a full season for the first time, so he should end up higher in the ranking this year if all goes well. Not sure if it has even happened before, but we are starting the new season without the World Champion as Nico Rosberg has retired after his championship last year. We have some old drivers that are not with us anymore like Jenson Button and an old driver that left us but came back, Felippe Massa. Then there is Stoffel Vandoorne a driver I’m looking forward too to see race this year even if it might be in a car that is still not up there with the top of the pack.

No more Bernie

Another big change for 2017 is the fact that we will not have Bernie around anymore. He has no doubt had a big influence in the sport and has change things in a positive way over the decades but he is also a stubborn man that did not want to change things that easily and seemed to make a lot of the decisions based on money. Tee new owner of the Formula 1 is said to do things differently. One small thing they already implemented is that the teams are allowed to post images and video from behind the pit boxes, the so called paddock, more and they have also said that the old European GP’s are whet they are going to focus on as they are the life of F1, something I can only agree with.

New cars

The biggest change for us viewers will be the cars, which will look a lot more aggressive with wider tires, larger wings and more sound. Also more freedom to develop in areas previously not allowed for example the barge boards behind the front wheels. All this is going to make the cars corner a lot faster, but will reduce the top speed a bit, but overall will make them 3 to 5 seconds faster per lap. The drivers should also have done a lot of training on their necks in order to cope with the added G-forces in the corners.

Anyway, I will be sitting in front of the TV next Sunday, with a nice breakfast and a few cups of coffee, as it is very early for me, but I can’t wait !

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Hunted: How to escape the law

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A while back there was a TV program in Holland called ‘Hunted’ where teams of 2 people had to evade a team of multiple people acting as the police in Holland (will be called ‘police’ after this). This team had the same tools at their disposal as the Dutch police has, at least that is what we were told. The teams that played the game knew they were going to play in advance, so they had time to prepare and at some point they got a message telling them the ‘game was on’ and from that point in time they were fugitives.

After watching the episodes it was pretty obvious that the rules of the game were very much in favor of the police, probably to show how good they were and that there is hardly any escaping them in real life either. 3 of the main examples were:

  • The teams were given a bank account with 500 euro and they were allowed to borrow another 250 from other people.
  • The only communication I have seen during the program from the teams was either phone calls or SMS
  • They could not leave the country

The last one I understand is needed for the program to work, the other 2 I understand from the police point of view, but if I had planned to do something that would make me a fugitive for real and had time to prepare I would do things a bit different and probably outside of the rules of the game.

Hunted: Take cash money

Well, this one seems obvious and we all have seen it in movies and TV series, the police can track your use of credit cards and debit cards, so do not use them during your escape. Giving the players the options to get money they had was a huge benefit to the police. Most teams were caught on camera while trying to get money from an ATM or while paying in a store. So the solution is simple, get as much cash as you think you will need in advance and take that with you while on the run. That will avoid you being spotted when getting cash while on the run.

Hunted: Communication

The players seemed to were only allowed to communicate by calling and sms, which of course is a ‘no go’ when you are on the run as you can see in every movie and TV series out there. Even a widely used app like WhatsApp will encrypt your messages which would make it impossible (or at least very hard) to read them for anyone else. There are also other ways to communicate, for example an app called Signal, which was used by Edward Snowden and he is still out of the hands of the NSA, so I think it works. There are also ways to email with people that stay hidden, something like ProtonMail for example which has end-to-end encryption and even has settings so email send to someone will be deleted after a set period of time. Some of the teams did get a new SIM card for their phone, but still used their old phones (which were traced already) and still used calls and sms. Having people play the game that are smart enough to get a new SIM card but do not use a new phone or encrypted communication also makes me believe they were just not allowed too. So, get new phones and pre-payed SIM’s (don’t pay for them with your own credit or debit card) better get a few just to make sure. Give one to someone you REALLY need to communicate with and make sure they stay hidden at all times. Don’t call, don’t send sms, use some encrypted way to communicate instead. Use wifi from Starbucks or McD’s and not the same one all the time of course.

Hunted: Your background

Almost right away the player’s social media were checked and some were caught because they were staying or communicating with their ‘friends’. Their social media profiles were also used by a profiler to get to know the players, getting to know what skills they have, what areas they know, if they can live a long time without friends and family and much more. The best way is to just get rid of all the social media stuff. Remove all your posts and delete the accounts or at least set stuff to private if possible. On Facebook for example you can set all your previous posts to private with just a few clicks, this way only friends will be able to see your posts.

facebook-limit-posts

Twitter seems to have something similar, but warns you that tweets posted before might be still visible at some locations. They mention that apps you gave permission to display your tweets might still show them.

twitter-privacy

 

On Instagram you can temporary disable your account which should make your account hidden from view. No idea if that actually works.

instagram-disable

Social media is one thing, but what kind of stuff do you have sitting on your computer, laptop, NAS, phone and tablet at home? Does one of them log in to your social media or email account automatically and do you have to put in a password of fingerprint every time you want to use it? Chances are that if the police gets a hold of one of those devices they can access all your stuff. This was also shown in the program. They used the Facebook account from one of the players to post a fake message to try and get one of her friends to reveal her whereabouts.  So, get a password on that stuff is the least you can do. I would just take all that stuff with me and store it in a safe location (are there still lockers at train stations?) or just trash it with a hammer, better safe then sorry I guess. Sure, taking your desktop PC with you might not be easy, but get the hard-disk out. I have a tiny and very light SSD in there, that will not be any problem.

Hunted: Transportation

There are camera’s everywhere on public transport, but also lots of crossroads have them and many more other places so there is a chance you are spotted everywhere. But to spot you they have to know where to look first, they do not track every camera in the country in real time. During the show people withdrew money from an ATM and with a camera near that ATM they were able to see the licence plate of the car they were in and track them from there, some people traveled by bike, which might work OK, but is slow. Other hitchhiked which is a good way to travel, but if you are on the run for real you might end up on a most wanted TV program with chances one of the people you hitchhiked with will remember you. For some reason all of the players avoided public transport, but to be honest I think that might actually be a good way to travel, especially during rush hour when it is crowded and you can blend in with the crowd. Wear a hat or a hoodie, sunglasses and headphones and they will probably not spot you on any camera IF they actually have any idea where to look and if you do not make a mistake, by using a public transport card on your name or pay with your debit or credit card to buy one I’m pretty sure they will not be able to find you.

Hunted: In the news

On January 18th the fugitive scenario became a reality in Holland. A prisoner that was transported to the hospital escaped his guards and took off. Today, 8 days later, there is no trace from that guy (at least he is not caught yet) which kinda proves it is very possible to keep away from the police when you are hunted. OK, chances are that guy has left the country already, but that usually is the objective of any fugitive and so far he seemed to know what he is doing.

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Verstappen’s wet weather masterclass

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Verstappen’s wet weather masterclass – one of the greatest ever?
Dat is dus de kop op www.formule1.com

Zeker niet alleen wij met onze oranje bril zien dus dat dit mannetje heeeeel erg goed is. Als Adrian Newey het voor elkaar krijgt een goede auto neer te zetten volgend jaar word het een goed jaar voor ons Nederlanders, maar ook voor F1 in het algemeen.

Ik ben ook erg benieuwd hoe Stoffel het volgend jaar gaat doen, maar ook de nieuwe jonge gasten dit jaar Ocon, Sainz (die een geweldige race reed) en Lance Stroll. Al ken ik die laatste verder niet, maar nog een mannetje van 18 erbij lijkt me prima, kijken of Vettel ook over hem zo moet janken 🙂

 

carlos-sainz

Carlos Sainz

stoffel-vandoorne

Stoffel Vandoorne

estaban-ocon

Esteban Ocon

lance-stroll

Lance Stroll

Verder gaan we natuurlijk afscheid nemen van een aantal van de ‘oude’ garde. Massa heeft in Brazilië al afscheid genomen en ook Button zien we niet meer terug. Dan duurt het niet al te lang meer of ook Alonso vertrekt en Raïkönen zal ook in 2018 niet meer rijden lijkt me zo. We gaan de komende 2 jaar dus een aardig verjonging meemaken. Laten we hopen dat dit ook de spanning weer terug brengt met mannen die niet vastgeroest zitten in oude gewoontes en monddood gemaakt zijn door de mediatraining. Een groot deel van de aantrekkelijkheid van F1 is de spanning, het gevaar, maar ook zeker de persoonlijkheden. Ik ben benieuwd.

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Maarten Memorial 2016 at Ahoy Rotterdam

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Maarten Memorial

I have been reading about the Maarten Memorial event for years now and have seen pictures of all the cars that are there during the event, but as it is usually on a weekday it wasn’t really possible to go and have a look, even when it is basically around the corner from where I live.

This event is held each year on august 4th in honer of Maarten van Sten who died on august 4th 2003 from skin cancer. Maarten was passionate about cars and especially Lotus cars and when driving one he didn’t feel sick for a while. After his death his friends Koen, Yvo en Sebastiaan organized the first Maarten Memorial in 2004 and since then it has grown too over 100 cars in 2016.

Because I have a 2 week holiday I had the chance to have a look at the Maarten Memorial and even thought the weather was not as nice and there was a bit of rain, I have seen some interesting cars that you don’t see a lot ‘in the wild’ usually.

Below is a very small overview of the cars that were there this year.

This memorial is not just there to honer Maarten, but it is there to gather money for cancer research. You can do that by sponsoring one of the cars or by a regular donation. For more information or to donate go to the website of the Maarten Memorial. I have to note that your donation will go directly to the research lab of the Daniel den Hoed, without going trough the Maarten Memorial organization,  so every cent you donate is used for research.

Website: https://www.maartenmemorial.com/
Donate: https://www.maartenmemorial.com/doneer

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Working with Mediawiki

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I have been working on wiki’s for a number of years already, not the wikipedia one as they have way to strict rules if you ask me and everything I added  on there was almost immediately removed again, so not going to edit anything on there anymore. Instead I have been working on a wiki for a videogame I play(ed) over at www.entropiaplanets.com. The wiki was there when I first arrived on the site, but there was basically nobody running it. like now, I had an interest in gathering info and data, so the step was pretty easy to dig into that wiki and add data to it. First this was with the basic wiki software but after another guy (Eric) joined in on the quest to collect data we changed it to Semantic Mediawiki (SMW) which gave us the power to do very cool things like displaying data not only in tables, but also in graphs and even on maps. Over time the work on that wiki stopped  due to loss of interest in the game and other stuff to do, but the interest in the wiki software stayed.

I ended up helping a few people with their wiki. People posting some problem or issue on a mediawiki developer page on Facebook which I am part of. So far it has been the Lost Media Wiki that needed some help with the way the wiki looked and I was able to help him a bit. This wiki is all about lost media, meaning videos, music, games that we know are made, but seemed to be lost for some reason.

Later it was the British India Wiki a wiki about British Indian coins. This wiki was being made with standard wiki software,. but the kind of data that was added was perfect for SMW, so I suggested this and made a small example wiki to show what was possible. A few hours later the wiki was changed to one that had SMW and I explained a few things about how to work with it and how to add things. Now, about a week later that wiki has grown pretty quick and the guy building it seems to like SMW and is pretty good with it already.