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Dragway upgrades its safety Fixes prompted by recent accidents By JULIE SWENSEN WHITE CITY -- After two serious accidents -- one fatal -- Southern Oregon Dragway officials are taking steps to improve safety at the drag strip. This week, volunteers are installing a 60-by-110-foot barrier filled with pea gravel at the end of the strip. It is similar to the gravel traps on runaway truck ramps on freeways. Dragway officials are considering installing a net specifically designed to stop cars. "It's one of the safest tracks on the West Coast," said dragway manager Wayne Seldon. "This is going to make it even safer." Volunteers from Southern Oregon Underground, a Central Point sand and gravel company, were installing the gravel trap at the strip this week. Seldon said he's sure that last month's death of drag racer Mel Bresaw of Gresham at the dragway spurred the work, which normally would have cost about $7,000. The gravel barrier should be done this weekend, Seldon said. Drag racing is scheduled to resume at the course June 18. Next month, the drag strip's steel guardrails will be replaced with concrete ones. Racers wedge in between the steel guardrail and it flips them over, and the steel is sharp and can act like a knife, Seldon said. With concrete, racers just slide down the barrier and back onto the track. Seldon said dragway officials also are looking into putting a big net manufactured specifically for catching dragsters just beyond the gravel trap. But "we want to get one phase done at a time." He didn't know of any other drag strip in Oregon that has either a gravel barrier or a safety net. A big reason the dragway is known for its safety is that it has a three-quarters-mile-long area where cars slow down at the end of the quarter-mile mark. But the long "shutoff," as the slow-down area is called, couldn't help racers in two serious accidents already this season. Bresaw's fatal accident occurred May 22 when his car continued past the finish line and crashed into a tree. It's unclear why the car crashed. It was the second death in the 20-year history of the track. A California racer died there five years ago. On May 29, David Reed of Sutherlin was critically injured when his car rolled at the strip. He suffered a broken back and a concussion and doesn't remember anything about the wreck or know what went wrong. But witnesses said oil came out of the right side of the motor and spilled onto one of the rear tires, causing the car to flip and go off the side of the strip. Reed, now out of the hospital, said Wednesday he "definitely" will return to race at the dragway. "The dragway has an excellent reputation and an excellent reputation for safety," he said. Reed said if it hadn't been for the track officials who called for a helicopter, the rescue crews who got him out of the car, and the Rogue Valley Medical Center staff, "I probably would have been paralyzed." Instead, he was up and walking around after only a week. "I'm going to make a full recovery, and I hope to go back to the Medford raceway as soon as I can get a car put together," he said. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA