Disbelief across pit and paddock as genial Indy 500 champion is killed after multi-car pile-up

Scotland’s Dario Franchitti last night secured his fourth IndyCar title in Las Vegas, but not in the circumstances which he or anybody else would remotely have desired.

The eagerly-awaited climactic round of the championship was grievously afflicted by a multi-car pile-up after just 12 laps and, a short time later, it was confirmed that Dan Wheldon, the 33-year-old English competitor, had been killed amid the conflagration which destroyed his car and ended his life.

Many vehicles caught fire during the crash, which involved as many as 15 competitors, and ensured that the denouement to the seven-month season was abruptly red-flagged by race officials, while medical staff and fire crew did their best to minimise the damage and injuries.

The mayhem was initially triggered when Sebastian Saavedra’s Conquest car clipped James Hinchcliffe’s Newman/Haas machine and, as the pursuing drivers plunged into the melee, several of them, including Franchitti’s closest challenger, Will Power, were catapulted into the air with nowhere left to go.

He was one of several competitors to require hospital treatment, but, amid the dizziness and back pain, most of the concern rightly surrounded Wheldon. Indeed, the fact that his car was immediately covered up by course workers at the scene testified to how another race had been overtaken by tragedy.

“IndyCar is very sad to announce that Dan Wheldon has passed away from unsurvivable injuries,” said the sport’s chief executive, Randy Bernard, who had communicated the news to the participating teams. “IndyCar, its drivers and owners, have decided to end the race. In honour of Dan Wheldon, the drivers have decided to do a five-lap salute.”

The Buckinghamshire man, who was victorious in this year’s Indy 500, was a friend of both Dario and his younger brother, Marino Franchitti, and was in line to win $5m if he had taken the checkered flag. However, monetary considerations were rendered irrelevant from the instant when his car flew into the air and apparently caught part of the catch fence outside of Turn 2.

In the next couple of hours, following the finale being red-flagged in such abrupt fashion, a sense of disbelief hung over the pit and paddock as normally steely men and women waited for news with pessimism lurking in their hearts.

“I have never seen anything like it in my life. It looked like a war scene from Terminator,” said the Penske driver, Ryan Briscoe. “There were pieces of metal and cars on fire in the middle of the track and debris all over the place. It was crazy.”

Franchitti escaped the worst of it, and one hopes that he will eventually be able to reflect on another auspicious chapter in his career, which has brought him four championships in the last five years. Yet the West Lothian man has suffered enough tragedies -- one of his closest friends, Greg Moore, was the victim of a terrible crash in 1999 -- to be aware that sport matters little in the grand scheme when people have been killed.

“I could see within five laps that people were starting to do crazy stuff,” said Franchitti, amid the chaos which surrounded the truncated proceedings and where even tough-as-teak individuals were in a state of shock. “I love hard racing, but that to me is not really what it’s about. You saw what happened, one small mistake from somebody . . .”

Questions will doubtless be asked in the days ahead about the number of cars -- 34 -- which had clogged up the grid for the season’s climactic event. And several of the drivers had expressed anxieties about the high speeds on the 1.5-mile oval circuit, which sparked a situation where they were recording speeds of 225mph in the pre-race qualifying session.

But the recriminations can wait, along with the tributes to Franchitti’s talent.Everybody’s thoughts will be with the family of Dan Wheldon, one of the most genial characters in the sport, who was unfortunate enough to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.