Promoter assures safety of event

the vindicator

In light of a tragic incident that took place last month at a Monster Jam event at the Tacoma Dome where a 6-year-old boy died and a man was injured after being struck by a Frisbee-sized chunk of metal that flew into the audience from a monster truck, Scott Neely of Image Promotions, spoke about the safety of the Monster Nationals show.

“We’re an MTRA [Monster Truck Racing Association] sanctioned racing body,” Neely said. “All of our vehicles are MTRA certified and they all follow MTRA safety guidelines. All of the trucks are inspected before each event and we do our best to make sure that all of the trucks are safe before they go on the floor. And if a truck shows up and is not up to safety standards, then we don’t use them. We like to think our events are the safest ones out there so we’re sticklers about that. There are no shortcuts.”

It should also be noted that Monster Nationals promoter/announcer George Eisenhart died as a result of a nonracing accident last month at an event in Wisconsin.

While Neely refused to comment on the tragedy, a statement at the MTRA Web site said, “Review of the incident shows that George accidentally stepped in front of a moving vehicle in a fashion that did not provide the vehicle’s driver adequate time to react. The situation did not happen as part of an actual competition portion of the event.”