NASCAR Issues Rules Change Following Canandaigua Crash

It didn’t take long for NASCAR to react to that fatal accident in Canandaigua last weekend involving Tony Stewart.  20-year old Kevin Ward, Jr. was killed during a dirt track incident when he was struck by Tony Stewart’s car.  On Friday, NASCAR issued a rule directing drivers not to disconnect any safety equipment following a crash until permitted to do so by safety personnel.  After that they must go directly to an emergency vehicle and are banned from going onto to the track or from approaching any other car.

All of those have been unwritten rules in racing, but NASCAR issued the directive to make it official.  Violations and penalties will be assessed on a case by case basis.

It’s probably going to be hard to keep drivers from getting out of a wrecked car in all instances, especially if that car is burning.  The directive goes into effective immediately at all levels of NASCAR racing.