Paul Walker death: Autopsy results pending in fiery Porsche crash
Autopsy results on “Fast and Furious†star Paul Walker and his friend Roger Rodas will not be released until Wednesday at the earliest, the Los Angeles County Coroner’s office says.
Autopsies on the men -- killed Saturday when the 2005 Porsche Carrera GT they were in crashed -- were completed Tuesday. But final identification of the bodies was not scheduled to start until Tuesday night, said Craig Harvey of the coroner’s office.
“No results will be released until at the earliest, tomorrow,†he said Tuesday in an email.
It was not yet clear who was driving the high-performance car when it crashed about 3:30 p.m. Saturday on Hercules Street in Santa Clarita.
Investigators so far have found “no evidence†of a fluid leak from the car at the scene, said Capt. Mike Parker of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department.
A leak of vital fluids could have pointed to an inability for the driver to control the 605-horsepower vehicle. Investigators want to retrieve computerized data from the car that would show its performance in the moments before the crash.
Detectives have not determined what caused the crash, but a preliminary investigation indicates speed was a factor, Parker said.
Just how fast the car was moving remains to be determined. The speed limit on the street is 45 mph.
Friends have told authorities the high-performance Porsche was not street racing at the time, and L.A. County sheriff’s officials say eyewitnesses did not see a second car.
A friend of the men, Jim Torp, said the tragedy began to unfold when Walker and Rodas slowly pulled out of the driveway as a charity event was winding down.
After they came back around for another pass and went out of sight, he and another car enthusiast listened to the sounds of the Porsche’s exhaust to gauge its speed.
“You could hear the exhaust -- they got on it a little bit -- and I heard two booms,†Torp said.
Smoke was visible from Always Evolving Performance Motors, a shop owned by Rodas located around the corner from the crash site.
The limited-production, 2005 Porsche Carrera GT has a history of being difficult to control.
The sports car is capable of reaching 100 mph in under seven seconds. It was built without the stability management system that most Porsche models are equipped with.
Tonight Show host Jay Leno, a veteran supercar driver, spun a Porsche Carrera GT at 180 to 190 mph at Talledega. “It was kind of like driving on ice,†Leno said on his Jay’s Garage website. Leno, however, praised the vehicle for its engine built for Le Mans and incredible gearbox.
The clearance on the $400,000 V-10 Porsche is very low, making it hard to drive on regular streets.
Jeremy Clarkson, co-host of BBC‘s Top Gear television show, said during his review of the car: “You need to be awake to drive this fast. It really isn’t an easy car to control. The clutch is brutal, the power is savage and the handling ... you really are on a knife edge. But if you put in the effort boy, oh boy do you get the rewards.
“It is a phenomena -- mind-blowingly good. Make a mistake, it bites your head off.â€
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