The 24 Hours of Le Mans is one of the world's most famous motor races. It has been held continuously every year since 1923 in the French city of Le Mans (Le Mans), on a 13.5 kilometre (13.5 mi) route consisting of the local circuit and sections of roads closed for the occasion. It is an endurance race, lasting 24 hours and involving cars of various categories, from prototypes to touring cars. In the beginning, each car had one driver, who had to cover the whole race alone. Later, the drivers became two and nowadays three.
The 1955 race was scheduled for 11 and 12 June and "counted" in the World Sports Car Championship. The start was given at 4 p.m. on June 11, in front of 500,000 spectators. The featured cars were Mercedes, Jag, Mazerati, Ferrari and Ashton Martin, but all eyes were on the new Mercedes-Benz 300 SLR, whose chassis was made of magnesium for less weight and better performance. The three cars were driven by the twins of Pierre Leveg and John Fitch, Juan Manuel Fangio and Stirling Moss (legendary names in Formula 1), Karl Kling and Andre Simon.
The terrible accident occurred at 6:26 in the afternoon and involved four cars. It all started with lead driver Mike Hawthorne, driving a Jaguar D-Type, who received the order to pit. He had just passed a slower car, Lance Maclean's Austin-Healy 100, when he braked almost abruptly to enter the pits. McLean's car swerved to avoid the collision, but failed to notice that two faster cars, the Mercedes-Benz 300 SLRs of Fangio and Levang were coming up behind him. Fangio was in second place in the race and was trying to dupe Levegg. The Frenchman was trapped and had no time to react. His Mercedes hit the rear of Lance Maclean's Austin-Healy 100 from behind and took off.
After tracing a spectacular trajectory through the air, it hit the left-hand side track barrier, caught fire and literally disintegrated. Flaming parts of the car fell into the crowd, including the engine, which was an absolute bomb, according to the description of an eyewitness. As if that wasn't enough, firefighters tried to put out the fire of the car's remains with the wrong liquid. They used only water, causing a new explosion.
82 spectators were killed in this Dante's Inferno scene, and what was left of the body of French pilot Pierre Levergue was recovered from the wreckage of the Mercedes. Meanwhile, Lance Maclean's Austin-Healy, which was hit by Leveg's Mercedes, took its turn hitting the barriers before returning rudderless to the track. Another spectator lost his life, while McLean was saved. Thus, the total toll of the accident was 84 dead and over 100 injured.
The race was resumed by decision of the organisers to allow the rescue crews to continue their work unhindered and to avoid traffic congestion on the roads from the departing spectators. During the night, when the death toll was now confirmed, Mercedes, who was leading the race with Fangio, decided to withdraw its cars as a mark of respect for the memory of the dead. He returned to racing years later. The other teams continued the race and the winner was declared the following afternoon by Englishman Mike Hawthorne, the man who had started the terrible disaster. No responsibility was found against him, as the commission of inquiry set up for the purpose concluded that everything had been done in accordance with racing practice.
The death of so many people, due to the lack of safety measures, raised a storm of reaction in Europe, going so far as to ban track racing in France, Switzerland, Germany and other countries until appropriate measures could be taken. In fact, in Switzerland the ban came into force only on June 1, 2007, with a decision of the Swiss parliament.
Source: sansimera.gr
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