You thought Tony Schumacher's 4.437 run was fast? He is crawling compared to this... How does 3.235 @ 412.50 grab you? Better yet... that record is held by a lady... driving a hydrogen peroxide powered rocket dragster. For the full list... http://draglist.com/lists/rkt-alltime.htm More about Kitty O'Neil http://www.answers.com/topic/kitty-o-neil
Know the list for yrs .. were even on one of his other list..but real cool for me ..other I knew #2 on that list very well .. Sammy Miller RIP
An interesting overview of the rocket powered dragster here http://www.draglist.com/stories/SOD Mar 2002/SOD-031402.htm
I watched the Pollution Packer crash, killing the driver at Gainsville, sometime in 1976 timeframe if my memory serves me correctly. It was the kids 21st birthday, his folks were in the stands and watched as they extracted his remains out of the vehicle in three pieces! Capt. Jack McClure, same kind of thrust on a go-kart.........................insane. John
one of my coworkers knew Chuck Suba and the X-1 team pretty well. I read some of the early magazine stuff he brought in. 5.41 @ 222 in 1967.
Well if you look at this satelite image of "Great Lakes Dragway" in Union Grove Wisconsin... you'll Notice the "Short" shutdown... I saw Art Arfons have Chute failure in the Green Monster and he ended up crossing the highway and harvested some corn back in the 70's...! http://www.google.com/maps?f=q&hl=e...ll=42.662084,-88.033276&spn=0.014107,0.031242 If you Zoom in a bit more You can see a pair of cars running down the 1/4... the car on the outside lane definitely smoked the car on the inside lane and is about to turn off by the sand traps...!
That's really frikkin cool my screen only shows the image 4" wide be about 1.5" high, and i have to scroll alor with the hand. Is there any way to make it bigger?
" At the 1973 US Nationals at Indianapolis, Dave Anderson attained his best ever performance with a pass of 4.62 seconds at 344 mph" I was there, I was eight, loudest damn thing I ever heard, coooooool. Rich
That stuff was born right here in the Twin Cities from the minds of George Weplo and Ky Michaelson. Ky just restored the car that Kitty drove, it was on display at our show in april.
I'm bringing up an old thread I found searching what I read in a physics book: "In 1977, Kitty O'Neil set records for "terminal speed" and "elapsed time" for a dragster on a 440-yd run. From a standstill, she reached 392.54 mi/h in a sizzling time of 3.72 s." It didn't mention it was rocket-powered, so I was curious. Here's an old Sports Illustrated article: http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1091963/1/index.htm This is funny: "The Air Force had also subjected a trained ape to similar rides. When offered a banana as inducement before one wild run, the ape hit its handler over the head with it." Thanks, Kurt
Doesn't the late Sammy Miller hold the record for fastest quarter mile of all time? Did it in England in the early 80's because there was no peroxide fuel pure enough to use in the states. plus pure peroxide is a weapons grade material. (So is nitro. Tim Mcveigh threw that in with the ammonium nitriate) The poor guy that got killed at Gainesville was named Russell Menendez, I think? Thanks for sharing your experience. Makes the sadness and tragedy more understandable. -90% jimmy
According to you tube Sammy Miller's Vanishing Point holds the record of 3.54 at ONLY 384. I think he got to the finish line too soon to go faster ? I saw it in action at York years back. Other cars "leave the line, " it's just GONE !
85% your correct. Just before the fatal run . Mr Mendez was honored with a birthday deal on the starting line. 1975 Gators
Thanks for posting the links, gang. Kitty went the three at nearly 400 on a marked off quarter mile on the salt flats. Sammy did his 3.58 at 386 on an actual drag strip. Kitty went 394 by the quarter, but continued accelerating to 412 on the run (after the timed quarter). bp
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