This caused significant deformation of the wheel rim and a spoke and resulted in the impression/abrasion described in the autopsy report. Earnhardt struck the steering wheel sub-mentally (on the underside of his chin). Earnhardt's, these inertial forces alone can be large enough to produce ring fractures of the skull base.Īs the circular arcing motion continued, Mr. This is the basis of the whip mechanism which occurs in right-side, angled, frontal collisions. Large inertial forces developed as the neck was stopping the forward motion of both the head and the helmet. As his chest and pelvis were stopped by the restraint system, his head began to follow a circular arc forward and down. Initially, his head traveled along this nearly straight line. the instrument panel with his knee, etc.). This motion was opposed by his restraint system, the steering wheel and the other components of the vehicle interior with which he interacted (e.g. Earnhardt moved forward and slightly toward the right in the vehicle. In accordance with Newton's laws and as a result of the crash, Mr. Frontal crashes which are angled to the right side of the vehicle are especially dangerous for the head and the neck of the driver. As such, the crash is over in "a blink of an eye," and the (change in velocity) occurs over a very short time, producing very large accelerations. The reason for this common misconception is that the frontal crash occurs in only one-tenth of a second. By contrast, many people have commented that the crash did not "appear" to be severe. Mathematical analysis and observation of the impact with the wall demonstrates that this was a very severe crash. Because there was no significant additional rotation of the vehicle after the crash, the (change in velocity) of the occupant is very similar to the (change in velocity) of the vehicle. This gave rise to a (change in velocity) with a PDOF (direction), which is predominately frontal and from the right. Earnhardt's velocity toward the wall was arrested and a component of his velocity along the track was also arrested. As a result, the impact with the wall was equivalent to a passenger-side angled barrier impact. Earnhardt's car contacted another vehicle, which increased its clockwise yaw angle relative to its direction of travel. As a result, while most of the velocity of the car was directed along the track, a significant component of velocity was directed toward the wall. A right steer corrected this trajectory, however, the vehicle yawed clockwise and began climbing up the track. Earnhardt's car initially yawed counterclockwise when viewed from above and traveled down (toward the center of) the track. Venous thrombosis complicates up to 31% of these fractures as many as 75% of caroticocavernous fistulae will have antecedent skull base fractures.Understanding the injury mechanism requires understanding and reconstructing the crash. Transsphenoidal basilar skull fractures are a particularly serious type of basilar skull fracture usually occurring in the setting of severe traumatic brain injury and with potential for serious complications including damaging the internal carotid arteries and optic nerves as well as high incidence of dural tear with CSF leak.
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