Street Racing....a lesson learned the hard way
 

This is reality....this happens all the time. :(

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Mark Tu (17) was killed when he crashed his car into a pole during a lunchtime race

Mark Tu died Friday inside the prized red car he called Foxy Roxy.

His 1995 Mitsubishi Eclipse wrapped around a utility pole moments after leaving Plano Senior High School for CiCi's Pizza at lunchtime.

Mark, a 17-year-old senior, was dead when police and paramedics arrived. A friend in the car was taken to Medical Center of Plano. The second teen's name was not released. Police said he was alert and talking at the hospital.

Mark and the driver of a black Ford Mustang were speeding when they came upon a third car driving the speed limit, police said.

Plano police spokesman Rick McDonald said investigators believe Mark's car collided with the Mustang and the third car before spinning into the pole.

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Police said Mark and his passenger were not wearing seat belts.

No charges had been filed, and police were still investigating. The Mustang was driven by another student, who was not injured. The adult driver of the third car also was unhurt.

Plano police said they were uncertain whether racing was a factor in the Plano accident. Racing is common along that strip of Park Boulevard near Woodburn Corners, just down the street from Plano Senior High, they said.

The impact of the accident pushed the utility pole to lean at nearly a 45-degree angle. About 40 to 50 students stopped at the accident scene during lunchtime. They hugged one another and talked about the crash, which many students had witnessed. Several called their parents and friends to tell them who died.

A number of classmates witnessed the accident.

Nathan Cory, 17, and Bryan Barrett, 18, who are also students at Plano Senior High, said they were driving behind Mark's car before the accident and ran up to try to help afterward.

They said they heard the passenger screaming. He was trapped in the crushed car, and they were unable to move him.

"We really couldn't do anything," Bryan said.

Plano's three senior high schools enroll juniors and seniors. They are all open campuses, meaning students can leave school grounds for lunch. At least a few other area districts, including Highland Park, Arlington and Fort Worth, have open campus policies that allow at least some of their high school students to leave at lunch.

Fort Worth school district Superintendent Melody Johnson has said she wants a districtwide review of the open campus policy there after a 15-year-old boy was injured in a lunchtime shooting last month at South Hills High School. Last year, a Dunbar High School football player died in a lunchtime car accident.

News of the accident in Plano spread quickly through the school.

"When students began returning from lunch and learning about the tragic accident, the teachers allowed them to go visit the counselors if they needed to," Plano schools spokeswoman Nancy Long said.

She said some students chose to leave school after they heard, and their parents were notified.

Senior Alex Rojas, who had known Mark since they attended Wilson Middle School together, was also on his way to CiCi's.

"It was hard having to witness that," he said. "It was tough."

Alex went back to school, signed himself out and left. He said people were talking in school hallways about the accident, some crying.

Mark's best friends said he was a fun-loving teen who loved his car.

Sean Garza and Catherine Samuels, both 16 and juniors at Plano Senior High, said the three of them were inseparable.

"We were a trio," Sean said. "We hung out every weekend, every day. He was an amazing person."

Mark worked at Planet Burrito and saved most of what he made to pump up Foxy Roxy. Sean said Mark had been saving for new tire rims.

Catherine's father, Barry Samuels, said Mark was a good friend to their family. The teen often came to their house after he left work.

"We will remember Mark for his kind and calm demeanor," Mr. Samuels said. "We really like and enjoyed Mark and are very, very sad."

Mark's Web page on MySpace .com shows pictures of his car. Photos document the work he put into it. He wrote "Racing= My life" and "I love my friends!!!!" on the site.

Mark wrote that he was into the rock band Blink 182. He preferred Pepsi to Coke. He was right-handed, and his weakness was love.

Friends began leaving messages Friday afternoon on his Web site.

"You'll always be on my mind and in my heart," one girl wrote. "Watch me from heaven! I love you times a billion."

Very Sad. :shakes head:

Didn't even get his pizza.

His myspace account:

MySpace.com - Dammitblnk182 - 20 - Male - PLANO, TEXAS - myspace.com/dammitblnk182

This is from a myspace survey he has listed on his profile

Survey Question:

I thought this was a recent incident...actually this happened back in 2006. Still, what a horrible accident.

Oh whoa! Good call. I didn't notice that either. Kind of creepy, it lists his age as 20 years old on myspace.

Auto update, maybe? Or someone could possibly be maintaining it. I have Facebook but never got into Myspace enough to sign up.

It is an auto update. So sad but it is temptations when a car pulls up beside you, and I will be honest over 80% OF THE CARS THAT PULL UP THAT WANT TO RACE ME AND THAT ARE ALL COCKY HAVE THE MUSTANG WITH THERE GIRL IN THE CAR. What morons I am not denying that I have not raced it is just I will not do it in a busy place.

This is precisely the reason the CHIPS police in California started building drag racing tracks back in the late 50's in order to get this crap off the public streets.

This is why I am an adamant proponent of states that allow the police to not only seize street racer vehicles when caught but also allows the police to not just impound the car but also immediately have such cars crushed whether the racer owner still owes on a loan on them or not.

These morons just don't get the plain and simple fact that other non-racing folks driving on the public roads are NOT aware that there may be idiots coming up from behind them racing. And frankly they should NOT have to be aware of that at all. These poor folks are just driving and reacting within the normal speed limits and reaction times. They will not usually realize these morons are going to be up on them in a matter of seconds. And then the ordinary driver reacts in their normal fashion to change lanes or something thinking they have plenty of time to do so because they don't realize the racers are coming at them at a much higher speed....and bingo...all of a sudden the racers have to unexpectantly adjust to the ordinary drivers actions...and now an accident event begins to happen that often costs people their life...

What kills me even more is that the street-racers that realize the dangers just blow the dangers off thinking it won't ever happen to them because their reaction times or driving skills are good enough. Well lets see these buffoons account for the unpredicted moves of the ordinary drivers...

I have no sympathy for people who street race....I am sorry this azzhole had to loose his life before the light-bulb went on...but I have a side of me that says this is one less moron that is jeopardizing the lives of ordinary drivers...and one less set of deleterious genes that would find its way into the gene pool so they won't get propogated further.

A word out to these azzholes at least in Ohio...Do you feel lucky, punk?......any street-racer that so much as even goes by me while racing another car, it's an automatic call on my part to the state highway patrol and I'm giving your license plate number up to them...I have been doing this for two years now and have helped remove a couple of these morons off the interstate highways here. :mad:

I would love to see more opportunities for kids like this to race on the track. Cheap track days would help relieve the competitiveness of younger children. With that said there is still NO excuse for such actions.

why do ppl not wear seat belts???i dont get it

I wonder the same thing. Honestly, it's not just an issue of your safety, but everyone else's on the road. I don't want to be driving & have to swerve because someone's body was ejected in front my car.

^^ i wouldn't like that either...i would swerve and turn my wipers on??

:rofl2: I hate to laugh but I had a mental image of that and for a split second it made me giggle.

*Swerves*

"Honey, what was that?"
"Oh, that was just Steve from across the street being ejected from the passenger seat. Guess he didn't wear his seatbelt again."

I don't think a seat belt could prevent a tree from taking you out.

^^ it would help from knocking out an innocent bystander from being hit by a body

X2 I always wear mine

*thump*

wipe wipe

keep driving

x3....I usually put it on before I even start the car. 2nd nature, really. I can't count the number of times it's saved me.

Idiot kid.

I'll admit, I street race... but this no experience having kid had no business doing it, especially given the conditions when he did it.

:shakes head: This is one of the reason WHY we strictly don't allow (encourage) street racing posts.

Awesome seatbelt commercial:

:eek: *speechless*

I feel NO sympathy. He was stupid doing something illegal putting others lives at risk.

Oh trust me if you did I would tear those kids apart who post stories.

You referred to him as a "no experience having kid".....that INFERS then that you think there is such a thing as an "experienced street racing person"...which in itself infers further that you think an experienced street racing person has some legitimate business being in the street for racing purposes...

Well I hate to interrupt your leap of logic you have going but there, numb-nuts, but there IS NO SUCH THING as an "experienced street racer" because you cannot predict how the innocent drivers sharing the road with the racers are going to react.

^ I was waiting to see who would jump on that.

Again... you don't wanna laugh... but it's so true, you just have to at the oddity of mentaly imagining that.

I'm SO glad you jumped on this.

1. There IS such a thing as a street racer with experience. I have PLENTY of experience. Well over 100 drag passes (in the Evo alone) and over 3 seasons of auto-x, three years of running in the mountains, etc. Of course none of this is gonna mitigate what other drivers on the road will do, which is why...

2. I DO NOT race in areas with ANY kind of traffic (that's the **** idiots do). We make absolutely sure there's no traffic before we run. Anything that might HAPPEN to come by is well known since there's there's only 2 ways onto the street (one on each end) and we have cars posted to let us know. On top of that, we race in the middle of the night (anywhere from 12-3) to further limit the chance of traffic. I remember once in the past 3 years a car came down our road while we were there.

3. We don't roll out like some big ricer rice-fest... we go out with about 10 cars MAX. We also don't take idiots that don't know how to control their car with us.

4. Find me an alternative.

Why didn't you?

I still don't understand why people don't wear seatbelts. Same with people on motorcycles... blows my mind that the vast majority don't wear at the very least helmets.

If you're going to straight line race.. do it on a track.

I'm sorry I could care less how "careful" you are. Don't get me wrong I've done the same thing in my day. Although I look back and see how stupid it was. Take it to a track, if you can afford the mods, you can afford the track. Just my personal opinion.

It takes no "driving" skill what so ever to go in a straight line. Sorry but it's true.

A real track takes skill, if you are good it will show. Have fun there man it's the best kind of fun, legally lol.

I'm done my /rant lol. I just hope people listen to what I preach lol.. That's what it comes down too.

2. You can never determine when will be or wont be traffic, no matter how far you can see ahead.

3.) one car or 10 doesn't matter its dangerous.

4.) The track. Thats why there are official meets, autocross, and forum groups who get together on a closed course.

There is NO excuse for street racing. You take your life and other lives and totally disregard them.

Now before the flame shield goes up I have to say that I am an experienced driver, and I have street raced Numerous times. That's before I totaled a car, and had some other friends die or get seriously injured. I'm not trying to be a hypocrite, I just have been there and learned from my experience.

Keep it off public streets, and in a closed coourse enviornemnt where you don't have all those risk factors.

bottom line.. **** is dumb

Don't do it

don't sugar coat it either...

yes I'm sure we have all done it at some point, don't get me wrong.. just be the bigger man and let **** go, believe me NOTHING and I mean NOTHING is worth your life! specially over some dumb ****.

Responses in bold.

I don't know man. Street racing is pretty dumb. Don't get me wrong I have done it, and truthfully I regret it. Let's be honest what does a straight line prove? **** I can build a B-18 Honda that'll kill in a straight. So what, that takes no skill in my eyes. A true driver knows when to have some fun and when to take it to a track to have even more fun. I'm sure I'll get flamed on this but I don't give a ****.

So you're the type that thinks drag racing takes no skill... :shakes head:

We race from digs, not rolls. Rolls are for fat people, Thanksgiving dinner, and people that can't drive.

Try consistently launching a car cutting 1.6 60's on street tires and hit your optimum shift points for each gear... consistently.

Also, I don't only drag. I run in the twisties as well (roads that are closed off to the public after a certain time and closed off to ALL for a period of time as well, with gate guards at each end).

And like I said already... I would LOVE to take it to the track.

bboy you're a br0 but it only takes one **** up and it only takes one car of those 3 to make a big big life changing mistake.

It proves the faster car and more consistent driver.

Would that Honda be able to hang from a dig? Like I said, I don't do rolls (anymore... did them way back when).

So am I not a true driver now?

More to a car than a line :tup:

I' not saying it takes no skill. If you can grab good 60' times more power to you.

I'm just saying for me, it takes more skill to be able to heel-toe through an apex then to power shift through a straight. Sorry bro this is going to be difference of opinion. So we'll leave it at that.

Oh no, I completely agree that running on a road course takes more skill... definitely. All I'm saying is that drag racing DOES take skill... it's not just clutch-shift.