Eyewitness Tyler Sandell disputes some parts of the official OMRRA account of the Portland F-USA crash as given by OMRRA President Spiros Gabrilis and posted on roadracingworld.com.

Sandell said he was watching the F-USA race after racing himself in the Super TT event held at Portland International Raceway, and that the first rider to crash was Zlock Racing’s Ty Howard, who highsided–just as we reported from the scene on Sunday. Sandell agreed with our earlier report that Craig Connell was collected by Howard’s bike, and that John Dugan–as Dugan himself told us on Sunday–fell while trying to turn inside the earlier crashes.

Sandell also backed up Gabrilis’ statement that an OMRRA cornerworker–Richard Matthews–was the first person to reach Connell, and pulled Connell out of the reach of flames set off when his gas tank spilled fuel. Matthews was assisted in pulling Connell to safety by racer Marc Palazzo.

Sandell called Roadracing World headquarters after reading Gabrilis’ statement, posted earlier today on roadracingworld.com.


This second eyewitness report just in from Morgan Broadhead:

Sorry for not responding sooner but I wanted to clarify something in regards to the fire in turn 9 at Portland. I was probably 30 yards from the end of the pits heading for the bridge when the accident occurred. I missed the actual incident but saw the post-crash events.

My hat is off to Marc Palazzo for returning to help the injured Craig Connell. The fuel from Connell’s tank ignited almost immediately. From my vantage point Craig was laying either in, or right next to, the fire. The other person that helped Marc was a cornerworker who had run up from turn 9. He actually reached Connell just before Marc but hesitated because of the fire. He was dressed only in a white T-shirt and shorts. Marc, (with full leathers, helmet and gloves) went right in and started pulling Connell out. As soon as Marc started pulling Craig, the cornerworker jumped in to assist. Kudos to both of these heroes.