When Corey Day ran the #7 car in Kyle Busch's honor, he came dangerously close to a fatal accident.

Motorsport writer Austin Konenski shared a video of the incident and wrote, “I just can’t express enough how lucky we are that Corey Day’s truck came back to the ground. Day would’ve went over that wall…My heart sank for a second.”

On lap 47 of the thrice-delayed Truck race, Day was nudged by Gio Ruggiero, which sent the #7 Chevrolet Silverado into a spin going backward towards the inside wall. The momentum lifted the rear wheels off the ground as the Spire car continued to spin with all four wheels being airborne, before the flaps helped bring the car down, and it made contact with the wall. 

Spire ran the #7 car in Busch’s honour with his name written on the rear window and a livery featuring Kyle Busch Motorsports. However, seeing Day go airborne left fans worried during a weekend in which we already lost a legend.

Fortunately, Day escaped the crash, going on to say: "The 17 (Ruggiero) just got a big run off of (Turn) 2 and he kind of started to shade down, so I shaded with him, he shaded back up and that was it... I just hate it for the #7 guys. This is exactly what i didn't want to do today. I just wanted to deliver them a good run. I feel terrible. I hate it."

Fans on Konenski’s post commented about how there was no catch fence where Day hit the wall. Safety concerns arose, but so did those who thought of it as a miracle save for Corey Day. 

What if the Car went over the Wall?

Fans took to social media to share their shock. “Nearly a sport ending crash holy f***,” wrote one fan, noting how terrible it would have been had the airborne car flipped. While the last fatal crash from a car going airborne was back in 2001, a car going airborne has other consequences.

“I don’t think I realized how close we were to a tragedy. Holy s***,” another fan added. When the #7 Chevrolet got airborne, the height almost cleared the wall, so the fact that there was no catch fence there isn’t as hazardous for the driver now as it is for the fans. But that's not all.

As one fan asked, "I haven’t been to Charlotte in a few years. I would assume the campers are not too far being that wall, correct?" The truck nearly cleared the wall near the infield campers, highlighting the potential danger to spectators.

One fan tried to lighten the situation by saying, "Like h*** my truck is going over that wall" - KB watching from up there."

Read more at the RFK Racing Digest!

Written by

Debrup Chaudhuri

Edited by

Siddharth Shirwadkar