INDIANAPOLIS -- With first- and second-degree burns on his nose and face, driver Rick Mears was released from the hospital Monday after an overnight stay.
Mears was burned during Sunday's Indianapolis 500 when his uniform caught fire during a fuel fill-in. The conflagration also hospitalized two of his crewmen.
'I was sitting in the car during a refueling pit stop when the nozzle worked loose and started spraying fuel around,' Mears recalled. 'The reached the cockpit and I didn't dare breathe for fear I'd inhale the flames.
'I kept my eyes shut and jumped out of the car, all the time trying to get my helmet off. I couldn't do it with my gloves. When a fireman tried, he had to back off because the helmet was so hot and it was burning his hands.'
Mears, 29, who won Indy in 1979, said he then saw a fireman with an extinguisher and grabbed the instrument.
'I tried to stick the nozzle in my face and pull the trigger, but I couldn't. My dad ran out and grabbed the extinguisher, spraying me to get the fire out and finally helping me get my helmet off.'
Mears said his fireproof uniform held off the flames and he was only burned where the 'Nomex' did not cover his face.
To prevent such occurences, Mears said the Indianapolis Motor Speedway should keep unauthorized people from the pits.
'Also, you got to have people better established for the job instead of the older guys who don't respond as quickly to an emergency,' Mears said.
'Teach them, give them lessons on what to do in this type of situation. Give them fireproof clothes like we wear instead of the ordinary clothes they wear because that stuff burns.'
Mears' chief mechanic, Derrick Walker, who succeeded Jim McGee on Team Penske, and crewman Bill Murphy are still hospitalized. Mears said Walker may have also suffered third-degree burns.
