The Vuelta de Necochea, second round of the 1988 Turismo Carretera championship, was held on Sunday, 06 March 1988, in the 6,480 kms public roads Circuito Benedicto Campos de Quequén at Necochea, province of Buenos Aires, Argentina, on the Atlantic coast, about 400 kms south of the Capital City. In the days before the event it was raining and the race day the route was wet and slippery, particularly on the dirt road Avenida Las Heras.
The accident happened at about 13h25. Four hundred meters before the junction between Almirante Brown Avenue and the Route 88, in a part of the circuit which had been resurfaced before the race, the blue Dodge #4 driven by Edgardo Caparrós from Venado Tuerto, Santa Fe, lost the front right wheel at about 230 km/h. The out of control car run over the side of the road, where the public was standing, watching the race. It crashed against a caravan, a parked car and ran over a tent, behind which it rolled five times and burst into fire.
More than forty-five spectators were involved in the accident. Co-driver Alberto Belloli, who wasn't the usual acompañante of Edgardo Caparrós, and eleven spectators were killed instantly or died shortly afterwards. Entire families were on the list, as the Lugercho case, that suffered the deaths of three members. 31 others were seriously injured. Another spectator wounded in the accident, Alberto Gómez, aged 43, passed away three days later. The eleven deceased persons were: Juan Amatto, 49, Juan Carlos Etchegaray, 46, Adrián Etchegaray, 16, Elena Hoger de Barberón, 55, Luis Gutiérrez, 7, Mario Orlando, 45, Silvana de Echeverria, 28 (probably pregnant at the time), Eduardo Villalonga, 64, Víctor Martín Lugercho, Estela Hansen de Lugercho and Vanesa Magali Hansen.
After the accident the race was immediately stopped and Roberto Mouras, current leader in a Chevrolet was declared the winner, from Jorge Oyhanart in a Ford.
Edgardo Caparrós, the winner of the last two races of the 1987 season at La Plata and Tandil, sustained face and head injuries in the accident. He never competed again. He was the son of Raimundo Caparrós who lost his life in an accident during a Turismo Carretera race, on 27 March 1965.
This was the worst accident in the history of motorsport in Argentina. After the tragedy that claimed the lives of 13 persons, the rules on semi-permanent public roads tracks in Argentina were changed, and the Turismo Carretera race were held only in closed circuits.
R.I.P
