This article lists the fatal accidents that happened in the Suzuka Circuit, a

motorsport Motorsport, motorsports or motor sport is a global term used to encompass the group of competitive sporting events which primarily involve the use of motorized vehicles. The terminology can also be used to describe forms of competition of two ...

race track that is operated by Mobilityland, a subsidiary of

Honda Motor Co., Ltd. is a Japanese public multinational conglomerate manufacturer of automobiles, motorcycles, and power equipment, headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Honda has been the world's largest motorcycle manufacturer since 1959, reaching a product ...

, located in Suzuka City in the

Mie Prefecture is a prefecture of Japan located in the Kansai region of Honshu. Mie Prefecture has a population of 1,781,948 () and has a geographic area of . Mie Prefecture is bordered by Gifu Prefecture to the north, Shiga Prefecture and Kyoto Prefecture to ...

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

. Twelve have involved

car A car or automobile is a motor vehicle with wheels. Most definitions of ''cars'' say that they run primarily on roads, seat one to eight people, have four wheels, and mainly transport people instead of goods. The year 1886 is regarded as ...

s, including one involving the safety car, and seven have involved

motorcycle A motorcycle (motorbike, bike, or trike (if three-wheeled)) is a two or three-wheeled motor vehicle steered by a handlebar. Motorcycle design varies greatly to suit a range of different purposes: long-distance travel, commuting, cruising ...

s. Seventeen people have died in accidents at the track during its half-century of existence, almost all of them Japanese professional racers, with the exceptions of American safety car driver

Elmo Langley Elmo Harold Langley (August 21, 1928 – November 21, 1996) was a NASCAR driver and owner. Langley primarily used the number 64 on his race cars during his NASCAR career. Racing career Langley began his racing career racing modified cars in Vir ...

and French driver Jules Bianchi. Deaths at the track have included that of

Honda RC211V The Honda RC211V is a 990 cc (60 cu in) four-stroke race motorcycle from HRC (Honda Racing Corporation) developed in 2001 to replace the two-stroke Honda NSR500. It was developed as a direct result of major changes to the regulations for the Worl ...

racer Daijiro Kato on April 20, 2003, after the

Japanese motorcycle Grand Prix The Japanese Motorcycle Grand Prix (日本グランプリ) is a motorcycling event that is part of the Grand Prix motorcycle racing season. The main venue who held the races for years was the Suzuka Circuit, until it permanently was replaced by ...

race. He died of a brain stem infarction after spending two weeks in a

coma A coma is a deep state of prolonged unconsciousness in which a person cannot be awakened, fails to respond normally to painful stimuli, light, or sound, lacks a normal wake-sleep cycle and does not initiate voluntary actions. Coma patients exhi ...

. Dome Karasu driver Tojiro Ukiya died in a test run on August 20, 1965, Lola T92/50 (with

Mugen Honda Mugen Motorsports (無限), legally known as M-TEC Company, Ltd., is a Japanese company formed in 1973 by Hirotoshi Honda, the son of Honda, Honda Motor Company founder Soichiro Honda, and Masao Kimura. Mugen, meaning "without limit", "unlimi ...

engine) racer Hitoshi Ogawa on May 24, 1992, while on the way to the hospital immediately after the Japanese Formula 3000 race; and

American American(s) may refer to: * American, something of, from, or related to the United States of America, commonly known as the "United States" or "America" ** Americans, citizens and nationals of the United States of America ** American ancestry, pe ...

NASCAR The National Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, LLC (NASCAR) is an American auto racing sanctioning and operating company that is best known for stock car racing. The privately owned company was founded by Bill France Sr. in 1948, and hi ...

safety car driver

died on November 21, 1996. Langley suffered a heart attack while driving the safety car. The most recent death to have happened at the track is that of Jules Bianchi on October 5, 2014, who collided with a crane tractor that was deployed to pick up

Adrian Sutil Adrian Sutil (; born 11 January 1983) is a German-Uruguayan racing driver who raced in Formula One for seven seasons: from 2007–2011, then 2013–2014. He drove for the Spyker F1 Team, Force India F1 Team and the Sauber F1 Team. He was also t ...

's car, which had spun out earlier. Bianchi succumbed to his injuries on July 17, 2015 following a nine-month coma, making him the first non-Japanese driver to die on the track in a crash.

List of fatal accidents involving competitors

Sources

{{reflist Suzuka