Death
On Monday, July 12, 1993, Davey Allison boarded his newly acquired Hughes 369HS helicopter to fly to Talladega Superspeedway to watch family friend Neil Bonnett and his son, David test a car for David's Busch Series debut. He picked up another family friend, legendary racer Red Farmer, en route to the track. Allison was attempting to land the helicopter inside a fenced-in area of the track infield when the craft nosed up suddenly, then crashed. The National Transportation Safety Board blamed the crash on Allison's inexperience in helicopters, coupled with the decision to attempt a landing. Neil Bonnett was able to free a semi-conscious Farmer from the wreckage, but could not reach Allison. Paramedics arrived and freed Allison, who was alive but had suffered serious head injuries. He died the next morning, July 13, 1993, at Carraway Methodist Medical Center. Thousands packed the auditorium at St. Aloysious Church in Bessemer, Alabama to pay their respects at his funeral. He is buried near his brother, Clifford, in Bessemer's Highland Memorial Gardens.
After the final race of the season, series champion Dale Earnhardt and race winner Wallace drove a side by side Polish Victory Lap carrying flags for fallen drivers Alan Kulwicki and Allison.
In his short NASCAR Winston Cup career, Davey Allison posted 19 wins, 66 top-five and 92 top-ten finishes. He also won 14 poles and earned $6,724,174. He is survived by his wife, Liz, and two children, daughter Krista Marie, and son Robert Grey.
Read more about this topic: Davey Allison
Famous quotes containing the word death:
“Do but consider this small dust, here running in the glass,
By atoms moved.
Could you believe that this the body was
Of one that loved?
And in his mistress’ flame playing like a fly,
Turned to cinders by her eye?
Yes, and in death as life unblest,
To have’t expressed,
Even ashes of lovers find no rest.”
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637)
“The dignity to be sought in death is the appreciation by others of what one has been in life,... that proceeds from a life well lived and from the acceptance of one’s own death as a necessary process of nature.... It is also the recognition that the real event taking place at the end of our life is our death, not the attempts to prevent it.”
—Sherwin B. Nuland (b. 1930)
“It is difficult to accept death in this society because it is unfamiliar. In spite of the fact that it happens all the time, we never see it.”
—Elisabeth Kübler-Ross (b. 1926)