Earnhardt’s Seatbelt OK? UPDATE 2: Dale Earnhardts seat belt did not break during his fatal crash at the Daytona 500, according to one of the first rescuers to come to his aid. Tommy Propst, a veteran Orange County firefighter and emergency medical technician, said he found the NASCAR legend strapped inside his crumpled car in the infield of Daytona International Speedway. Propst said the seat belt was tight enough that he had to pull the seat-belt buckle repeatedly before it popped open. “Somebody hollered, Ill cut it. I said, No, let me try it. I reached over, pulled, and I had to really jerk. I pulled hard, and thats when it come open,” Propst told the Orlando Sentinel. “If it would have been broke, the whole thing would have come open because I was jerking. . . . It was in one piece at the time.” Propsts account breaks two months of silence by the men and women who tried to save Earnhardt. To this day, Propst said, he has never been questioned by anyone from NASCAR. NASCAR officials Saturday refused to respond to Propsts statements. See full story at the Orlando Sentinel: Rescuer: Earnhardt seat belt was intact and a 2nd story: Firefighter wrestled over whether to come forward UPDATE: The NASCAR Winston Cup series was racing in Fontana, Calif., where director Gary Nelson disagreed with Propst’s account. NASCAR has refused to display the seat belt and hasn’t said if the results of its own investigation by unidentified experts will be made public. The probe is expected to last throughout the summer. “I don’t know of anybody that does a big investigation and tells the world their conclusions on a daily basis until the investigation is concluded,” NASCAR chairman Bill France told the AP.(That’s Racin’/AP)(4-29-2001) UPDATE 2: better explainations at NASCAR.com: NASCAR disagrees with seat belt claim and That’s Racin’: Rescuer, NASCAR at odds on belt(4-30-2001) UPDATE 3: The woman who climbed into Dale Earnhardt’s car after his fatal crash at the Daytona 500 said Monday that she was too busy trying to save him to tell whether the seat belt was broken. But Patti Dobler, a member of the rescue crew at Daytona International Speedway, said the man with the best view was Orange County firefighter Tommy Propst, who continued to insist Monday that Earnhardt’s five-point safety harness was intact after Earnhardt’s Chevrolet hit the track wall(full story at the Orlando Sentinel)(5-1-2001)
