During the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, Formula One driver Fernando Alonso was involved in a crash that was equal parts terrifying and spectacular. We can say that because he walked away with barely a scratch on him, something that will be hard to believe when you watch this video:
[[372854611,C]]
Alonso was traveling nearly 200 miles an hour when his right front tire clipped the left rear tire of Esteban Gutierrez. Alonso hit the wall, went airborne and flipped a few times before smacking in to another wall. When the car finally came to a stop Alonso shocked the relieved crowd by almost immediately getting out and walking away with only a slight limp.
Alonso said he's just fine and proceeded to describe the ordeal.
“You are not exactly aware where you are," said Alonso. "You are just flying and then you see the sky, the ground, the sky, the ground and you don’t know. Then I didn’t know where I was because I was so far from the track. Everything happened slower than on the outside. You want to stop and it doesn’t stop, it keeps going and going and going. It was quite scary.”
Scary for him, and scary for people watching ... including one particular fan who was immediately on the driver's mind.
“When I stopped I saw a little space to get out of the car and I went out quickly just to make sure that my mum, who was watching the race on TV at home, could see that I was okay."
The race was stopped for 20 minutes to clean up pieces of the car from the track. Nico Rosberg ended up the winner.
