Death of Dale Earnhardt

On the afternoon of February 18, 2001, American stock car racing driver and team owner Dale Earnhardt was involved in a final-lap collision in the 2001 Daytona 500, in which he crashed into a retaining wall after making contact with Sterling Marlin and Ken Schrader. He was pronounced dead at Halifax Medical Center a short time later; the cause of death was a basilar skull fracture, which was determined to have killed him instantly.

Earnhardt's death was officially pronounced at the nearby Halifax Medical Center at 5:16 p.m. EST (22:16 UTC). At the time of the crash, he was 49 years old. His funeral was held four days later at the Calvary Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. Earnhardt was the fourth NASCAR driver killed by a basilar skull fracture during an eight-month span, following Adam Petty in May 2000, Kenny Irwin Jr. in July 2000, and Tony Roper in October 2000. Earnhardt's death, seen on a live television broadcast with more than 17 million viewers, was highly publicized and resulted in various safety improvements in NASCAR auto racing.

After Earnhardt's death, NASCAR began an intensive focus on safety—mandating the use of head-and-neck restraints, installing SAFER barriers at oval tracks, setting rigorous new inspection rules for seats and seat-belts, and developing a roof-hatch escape system and the Car of Tomorrow—which eventually led to the development of a next-generation race car built with extra driver safety in mind. Since Earnhardt's death, no driver has died during competition in a race of NASCAR's three major series.

Earnhardt died while competing in the 2001 Daytona 500, a NASCAR-sanctioned automobile race at Daytona International Speedway. NASCAR sanctions required the use of a carburetor restrictor plate for races held at that track as well as Talladega Superspeedway. In 2000, the year before Earnhardt died, NASCAR instituted additional restrictions to the springs and shocks used on the cars, causing Earnhardt to complain to the media, "[The rules] took Nascar Winston Cup racing and made it some of the sorriest racing. They took racing out of the hands of the drivers and the crews. We can't adjust and make our cars drive like we want. They just killed the racing at Daytona. This is a joke to have to race like this."

In response to criticism such as Earnhardt's, NASCAR developed a new aerodynamic package for the cars competing in Winston Cup Series races at Daytona and Talladega. In the initial running of this aerodynamic package at Talladega, Earnhardt passed 17 cars within four laps to win the fall 2000 Talladega race which proved to be his 76th and final career win. The 2001 Daytona 500 was the first 500-mile (800 km) race run at the track with this package, which was designed to keep cars bunched up close together and to allow more frequent passing at high speed.

In the weeks before the Daytona 500, Earnhardt elected not to attend the annual fan and media preview event, drawing vocal criticism from fellow driver Jimmy Spencer. On February 3 and 4, 2001, for the first time in his career, Earnhardt participated in the Rolex 24 endurance race at Daytona, the event which kicks off Speedweeks at the track. Earnhardt and his teammates, Dale Earnhardt Jr. (Earnhardt's son), Andy Pilgrim and Kelly Collins, finished fourth overall and second in class.

The morning of the race, Earnhardt appeared confident and relaxed. He was a front-runner throughout the race, leading 17 laps. In the first three quarters of the race, there were only two caution flags: the first one on lap 49 when Jeff Purvis hit the wall exiting turn 4 and the other on lap 157 when rookie Kurt Busch hit the frontstretch wall while trying to pass Joe Nemechek and slid through the infield and onto pit road.

On lap 173, Earnhardt's car was in seventh place, with two of his team's cars, the blue No. 15 Chevrolet driven by Michael Waltrip and the red No. 8 Chevrolet driven by his son Dale Earnhardt Jr., running first and second in front of him. On that lap, a huge crash on the back straightaway eliminated 18 cars in a spectacular fashion. Those involved in the crash were Jason Leffler, Steve Park (another of Earnhardt's drivers), both Rusty (who would rally back to finish third) and Kenny Wallace, Jeff Gordon (the eventual Winston Cup champion for 2001) and Robby Gordon, both Bobby (the defending Winston Cup Champion) and Terry Labonte, Mark Martin, Tony Stewart, Elliott Sadler, Jeff Burton and Ward Burton (who had led the most laps in the race so far with 53), Jerry Nadeau, John Andretti, Buckshot Jones, Dale Jarrett (the defending Daytona 500 winner), and Andy Houston. The crash began when Robby Gordon turned into Ward Burton at the exit of turn 2. Stewart got hit by Ward, turned backwards against the outside wall, and was pushed airborne over Gordon. Stewart then flipped over twice, hooking to Bobby Labonte's hood, and stood on his front wheels before coasting to a stop in the infield, while Burton's car turned sideways and collected most of the field behind him. Earnhardt, Ron Hornaday Jr., Ricky Rudd, Ken Schrader, and Jeremy Mayfield were several of the drivers who escaped the crash scene. The race was red-flagged to allow for cleanup.