Australia’s Mount Panorama Circuit is already one of the toughest, most demanding racetracks in the world, packed with blind corners, huge elevation changes and unforgiving concrete walls. As is so often the case in Australia, though, the wildlife presents an extra layer of danger.
In this case, though, it’s not venomous snakes or spiders the drivers need to worry about, but bouncy marsupials. It’s not an unusual sight for a kangaroo to find its way onto the circuit, which sits in the town of Bathurst, New South Wales, a few hours west of Sydney, and usually, race officials are able to spot the encroaching animal and throw a caution before things have the potential to go horribly wrong.
That wasn’t the case in this year’s Bathurst 12 Hours, though. Just 20 minutes into the event, with the track still in pitch darkness following the 5:30am green flag, the race of the No. 64 Ford Mustang GT3 – a model making its debut at the endurance classic – came to a gruesome end.
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One Animal was Harmed
Initial scenes from the race broadcast showed the Mustang stopped by the side of the circuit with driver Chris Mies standing on the other side of the concrete barrier, his face and race suit covered in some sort of dark fluid. The commentators speculated that the car had suffered some sort of high-pressure failure that had caused oil to enter the cockpit. However, it quickly became clear that the truth was a lot gorier.
In a pit garage interview, Mies’ co-driver Dennis Olsen confirmed that the incident was in fact the result of an animal strike on the fastest part of the circuit, the Conrod Straight. The car was travelling at an estimated 250 KPH – around 155 MPH – when it hit the unfortunate roo. Replay footage showed that the yellow flag had been thrown, but it all happened too quickly for Mies to react.
Later imagery of the car being recovered showed a missing hood and a caved-in windshield – not exactly surprising given the impact speed and the fact that a fully grown kangaroo can weigh up to 200lbs.
A Grisly Experience
Confirmation that the Mustang hit a kangaroo on Conrod Straight. Mies appears shaken – as you would be – but ok.
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Following the incident, Mies, who was shaken but thankfully unharmed, spoke to Australian outlet Speedcafe, and painted a pretty unpleasant picture. “We were all in line and basically within a thousandth of a second, a millisecond, the kangaroo showed up on the left, obviously at a very high speed,” he said.
“If I can just imagine the whole kangaroo would have come inside. I mean, half of it was inside, so I’m glad I’m standing here now.”
Mies went on to say that his eyes were full of kangaroo blood following the impact, and that the sheer smell caused him to vomit: “I can tell you the inside of a kangaroo doesn’t smell very nice.”
A Chaotic Race
Mies’ unfortunate run-in with the local wildlife wasn’t the only major incident during the 12-hour enduro. With just over a quarter of the race left to run, a Porsche 911 and Aston Martin Vantage found themselves stranded on a blind part of the circuit.
The leading pack, with the Craft-Bamboo Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 being driven by Ralf Aron heading up the field, was fast approaching the stricken cars, and a combination of an unfortunately-placed marshal post and communication issues that the car had been experiencing meant Aron didn’t see the crash until the last moment. This led to him hitting the stationary Porsche at full race speed, a brutal impact that left him with two fractures in his back.
The incident-strewn race was eventually won by a fellow AMG GT3, the Team GMR car of Maro Engel, Mikael Grenier and Maxime Martin.
