YEAR OF TRAGEDY: From the archives of Bob Montgomery, motoring historian.
Fifty years ago, motorsport enthusiasts in Ireland and throughout Europe were looking forward to a year of close competition in their sport.
The 1954 season had been superb. The 'Silver Arrows' had returned to Grand Prix racing in the hands of Juan Manual Fangio and three German drivers, Karl Kling, Hans Herrmann and Hermann Lang, who had been the 1939 European Champion. Of the six Grand Prix they entered, Mercedes took four wins, the other two races falling to Ferrari, enabling Fangio to secure his second World Championship.
The 1954 season was also notable for the maiden Formula One victory of young British driver Stirling Moss who won at the non-championship Aintree, while he took his first World Championship points with a third place at the Belgium GP. For the 1955 season he would join Fangio at Mercedes.
At Le Mans Frolin Gonzalez and Maurice Trintingant won driving a Ferrari while here in Ireland, in the Tourist Trophy race at Dundrod, a DB Panhard driven by Loreau and Armagnac was the surprise winner. Elsewhere, the Leinster Trophy race would once again be held on the challenging Wicklow circuit but there were doubts over the Curragh circuit after the fatal accident there during the 1954 Wakefield Trophy race.
The scene was thus set for a bumper season in 1955. Instead, 1955 turned into a year of unmitigated tragedy for motor racing both in Europe and in Ireland which led to temporary bans on the sport in several countries and a permanent ban on motor racing in Switzerland.
The first half of the 1955 season fully lived up to its promise, the highlight undoubtedly being the winning by Stirling Moss and Denis Jenkinson of the Millie Miglia, the 1,000-mile race over public roads in Italy - on May 1st. This drive was truly the stuff of legend and must surely rank with Fernand Gabriel's drive in the prematurely ended Paris-Madrid Race of 1903 as one of the greatest drives in motorsport history.
The motorsport world then looked forward to an epic battle between the on-form Mercedes and the Jaguars at the annual 24 Hours of Le Mans in June. But, just two and a half hours into that race, a pall of black smoke rose from the pit area. What happened is still hotly debated but Hawthorn (Jaguar) had just lapped Levegh (Mercedes) and Macklin (Austin-Healey) before pulling into the pit area. Macklin swerved to avoid the Jaguar and poor Levegh struck the bank trying to avoid Macklin.
The Mercedes disintegrated and its wreckage left a death toll of over 80 including Levegh. In the light of this enormous tragedy the victory by Hawthorn and Ivor Bueb in a Jaguar had a hollow ring. The shockwaves echoed around the world of motor racing and led directly to the permanent Swiss ban.
In Ireland, the Golden Jubilee Tourist Trophy Race in September promised to be one of the best ever with three works Mercedes entered for Fangio, Moss and Von Tripps. As at Le Mans, tragedy struck early in the race when on only the second lap, Jim Mayers lost control at Deer's Leap and crashed, hitting a stone gatepost.
Meyers was killed instantly and burning debris was strewn all over the road. W Smyth's Connaught hit part of the wreckage and disintegrated, the driver also losing his life. And, if this was not sufficient tragedy, more was to follow when later in the race Mainwaring overturned his Elva which burst into flames bringing to three the number of deaths in this race.
It was the end of the TT at Dundrod and changed motor rracing in Ireland forever, just as the Le Mans tragedy had changed the face of motor racing in Europe.