Late pileup at Toronto left many with nowhere to go but up

Race cars aren’t designed to fly, but it’s happened two times in a span of seven days for the same team in the NTT IndyCar Series. Spread across four cars in the first ordeal and six in the second, all of the NTT IndyCar Series’ advanced safety systems attached to the spec Dallara DW12 chassis withstood the multiple hits and protected their drivers.

On the final lap of race two at Iowa Speedway, it was A.J. Foyt Racing’s Sting Ray Robb running over the back of an out-of-fuel Alexander Rossi, which fired Robb’s No. 41 Chevy skyward and into a barrel roll before sliding to a stop upside down. Rossi, Ed Carpenter, and Kyle Kirkwood were also taken out in the crash, and by Monday, Robb—who was airlifted to a local hospital for further evaluation—was released and cleared on Tuesday to complete this weekend in Toronto.

The scary incident in Canada was started by Pato O’Ward, who spun his car and backed it into the Turn 1 barrier on the left. Close behind and with nowhere to take avoiding action, Marcus Ericsson hit the side of O’Ward’s car and went hard into the wall with the nose and left-front suspension.

With the sloped nose of his car facing oncoming traffic, O’Ward watched as three drivers in rapid succession drove over his front wings, nose, and the front of his Dallara chassis, starting with Pietro Fittipaldi, who was briefly airborne before crashing to the ground. Next was Ferrucci, at a higher rate of speed, who launched from O’Ward’s car, turned 90 degrees and ran across the fencing before completing the inversion and landing top down.

O’Ward’s teammate Nolan Siegel was the last to strike the No. 5, which turned the nose of the car and pointed it toward Turn 2 as Siegel bounced to the right and hit the righthand wall. Toby Sowery tried to stop, but he lightly struck the rear of Siegel’s car.

The AMR Safety Team prioritized the inverted No. 14 Foyt Chevy and Ferrucci, who told the team over the radio that he was OK, climbed from the car. Ericsson was able to drive away and get as far as Turn 3 before the damage to his car forced him to stop. Among the rest, only Sowery was able to continue and complete the race and recovered to finish 15th.

“The cars are so safe, to have a scary accident like that — just to walk away — [I’m] fine,” said Ferrucci, who was credited with 20th. “No, I never saw Pato. When I came through there, I never saw Pietro clip him and nothing [from] the spotters. There was no yellow, no nothing, so I didn’t know to check up. Just super unfortunate.”

Fittipaldi echoed Ferrucci’s view of the situation.

“There was nowhere to go,” he said.

Story originally appeared on Racer