Horrible LF-A accident

9758 Views 10 Replies 9 Participants Last post by Thiphrisity, Jul 22, 2015

Sven76

Discussion Starter · Jun 24, 2010

Hi all!

First post from me and bad news from Germany. Yesterday, a horrible accident involving a LF-A prototype happened. The testdriver of the LF-A died at the scene, it was Hiromu Naruse, Toyota's head test engineer. According to the police, the LF-A was on his way from the Nürburgring on a public road to the Lexus test centre and the LF-A came - for unknown reasons - onto the wrong side of the road in a long curve, colliding with a BMW on his way to the N'ring. The two test engineers in the Beemer series 3 survived, although seriously injured.

From the pictures shown by German newspapers on their webpages it appears that the LF-A was the sport version (fixed wing). Those pictures also remind one that driving a car always involves some risk.

Sven

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1 - 11 of 11 Posts

doublexl

· #2 · Jun 24, 2010

could be possible that the driver of the LFA zoned out and forgot which country he was in. remember, in japan they drive on the left hand side, germany drives on the right hand side.

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Yeah it was the GT version right..? I read about this. Sad story, and I guess the car didn't have all the normal safety features. It doesn't look that bad, but neither did the vette that crashed at TMS here and killed the passenger and left the driver in a coma...

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Sven76

Discussion Starter · #7 · Jun 26, 2010

Yes, it was the GT version. All three people involved wore helmets and all airbags at the Beemer got activated. Police said that there was a hell lot of electronics in both cars and maybe that got in motion and made everything worse...

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Flipside909

· #8 · Jun 30, 2010 (Edited)

doublexl said:
could be possible that the driver of the LFA zoned out and forgot which country he was in. remember, in japan they drive on the left hand side, germany drives on the right hand side.

Hate to say it but that's kind of an ignorant statement to make as he's been stationed in Europe since the 1970's. As you know most of Europe are left hand driving countries. He has had the most exposure to the Nurburgring in Germany of any of his native Japan. So to say he zoned out...

All the LFA prototypes made to date are all right hand drive, none of them have been manufactured as RHD to date. As a matter of fact, I was one of very few to ride shotgun with Naruse-san in the LFA in Miami last year...he knows the LFA and LHD very well. Here's video of me riding shotgun in the White w/Red interior LFA borrowed from Europe...

RIP Hiromu Naruse

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flightz71

· #9 · Oct 28, 2010

Flipside909 said:
Hate to say it but that's kind of an ignorant statement to make as he's been stationed in Europe since the 1970's. As you know most of Europe are left hand driving countries. He has had the most exposure to the Nurburgring in Germany of any of his native Japan. So to say he zoned out...

All the LFA prototypes made to date are all right hand drive, none of them have been manufactured as RHD to date. As a matter of fact, I was one of very few to ride shotgun with Naruse-san in the LFA in Miami last year...he knows the LFA and LHD very well. Here's video of me riding shotgun in the White w/Red interior LFA borrowed from Europe...

RIP Hiromu Naruse

I'm curious to what you think happened then? His skill is obviously bar none, so I thought the most logical explanation would have been the whole old age and forgetting he wasn't in Japan thing. I think it's highly unlikely the steering rack came undone and he couldn't steer the car...

-C

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