'Biggest incident I've seen': Inside Tassie's desperate recovery mission

Supercars Recovery Coordinator Alistair Walker has been to many crash sites over the years. However, few left him as wide-eyed as the events of Tasmania 2017.

One of Symmons Plains' most remarkable days came amid 15 seconds of chaos, with a dozen cars damaged in a dramatic pile-up that turned the run to the hairpin into a wrecking yard.

On lap 2, contact between Fabian Coulthard and Rick Kelly caused a chain reaction that saw Garth Tander spin in the middle of the field. Those behind had nowhere to go.

The race was immediately suspended. Will Davison, nursing back injuries, gingerly alighted from his car and laid down near the Armco barrier. Drivers who could get out, did. Some couldn't.

This is where Walker's job began.

“We arrived on the scene and thought, ‘Holy shit, there's a lot of cars here’. But you quickly become very methodical,” Walker told Supercars.com.

"It was a matter of assessing the drivers are okay, given most of them actually couldn't get out of their cars.

"We worked with Dr Carl [Le] and the medical guys, making sure that everything was actually alright first. Then you start to work out, ‘Okay, what have we got here?'

“There was a lot to do."

With any red flag, the ambition is clearing the site to allow the racing to resume. But this was no ordinary incident: the tight confines of the Symmons straights made it a tricky scene to clear, all while accommodating an ambulance for the injured Davison.

Walker's mission was to arrest the scene, get cars back to the paddock, clear the damage, and offer a chance to restart the race. However, the hurdles began to stack up, one by one.

"Davo got hurt pretty badly, so once the scene was under control, we began moving cars. Of the 11 cars, I think we towed seven of them,” Walker said.

"Logistically, it began to get demanding because we only had three trucks that weekend. At most meetings apart from Bathurst and Adelaide, we'd normally run four.

“So, the minute you start going in multiples above the resources you've got, you need to start thinking about, ‘Okay, which cars am I going to take first? Which ones do I move over to the side, and possibly a clear path for the field?'

“Then, ‘If it's not red flagged, is there a clear path that the Safety Car can get through?' If in that case where it's red flagged, let's start moving this stuff out of the way, so if they want to get it going, at least there’s a clear path.

"You need to know what and where your resources are. We had a tilt tray and a Manitou that were in front of the field up at the hairpin.

“It needed to come down effectively reverse direction. Then there’s race direction, and how we manage that. Something like that can be tricky in Tassie because there's only so many radio channels to operate on.

"You can't always get clear communication to the trucks because the fire guys are working on one channel, or medical, or whatnot. So everyone needs to work together, and we did."

Some drivers were able to get out of their cars. Scott Pye, for example, had to straddle the wall and escape through a thin piece of real estate. Garth Tander, though, was trapped for nearly 15 minutes.

For Walker, time was of the essence. However, as professional as ever, he wasn't overawed by the scale of the task.

“It was like a puzzle. But when you look at it logistically, it begins to fall into place,” Walker said.

“For example, if we move that car out of the way, then Tander can get out of his car. He was in there for a while.

"It took a while to clear, but it's by far the biggest Supercars incident I've seen.

Walker has struck a close bond with Supercars Medical Delegate Dr Carl Le, with the duo at the heart of attending to and unpacking Supercars' most dramatic incidents.

Most recently, they flew into action in Melbourne, when Broc Feeney's Ford pin-balled off Cooper Murray and Zach Bates' Camaros just seconds into the race.

They were also there when Chaz Mostert suffered his shocking accident in 2015 Bathurst qualifying. Dr Le needed to get to Mostert as safely as possible, and Walker played a key role in making that happen.

"Whether it’s this crash or what happened in Melbourne recently, you need to be as calm and methodical as possible," Walker said.

"Carl and I have worked together for many years. We both started at Supercars around the same time, and we’ve worked on a lot of big incidents. Some incidents haven't necessarily seemed big, but ended up being big. We know each other really well. We know what each other needs.

"I think back to the Chaz incident at Bathurst when he broke his leg. It was a case of, ‘Okay, Carl's dealing with Chaz in the car, while I'm dealing with the fact that he needs the door out the way.'

"We work very well together, and we don't necessarily need to talk too much as it’s all unfolding. I know what he's doing and what he needs to do, and I work around all of that while he's doing that to help him if he needs help.

"Things move fast. Take Melbourne as an example, he'd already cut the power to Feeney’s car because he was there just before I was. Normally, that's the first thing that I'd do if I'd got there.

"Feeney was getting out the car, so he's dealing with that, and then he's got obviously a couple of other drivers that the rest of the medical guys are dealing with. We're not telepathic, but we know what each other needs and go about it without any fuss."

In Tasmania, Walker and his team got the job done. However, Mother Nature won, and the sun set around Symmons Plains. Officials tried to restart the race, but by that stage, it was out of Walker's hands.

"It was pretty spectacular, but it was quite rewarding when we got it done. Seeing the medical guys, the fire guys, and the recovery guys all working together was great to see,” Walker said.

"I think I'm pretty lucky. We've got a solid group of people in the recovery team that do a lot of events throughout the year at multiple circuits,” Walker said.

“They’re all very keen to do the best they possibly can. That’s doing everything safely, making sure they do everything without causing any further damage, and making sure they can get it done as quickly and practically as they can so everybody can get racing again.

“A lot of these people do this for a living, so it's not like it’s the first time that they've turned up to a race meeting. To have that core bunch of people involved makes it really humbling when everybody puts in, goes about it and gets the best result.

“They understand that they're on television just like everybody else, and they understand that they need to go about their job in a professional manner."

So, what if it happened again? Walker laughed.

"I don't mind not being busy, but I'm happy to do the job when we need to."