I read the same story on LS1.com yesterday and supposedly it was fabricated. Still, it is pretty sad. The bad thing is, stories like this seem to happen a lot, and it usually some 16 or 17 year old who thinks they are Mario Andretti and does stupid stuff like passing on the shoulder. I've seen plenty of people do that before, and one time I almost got killed from it when a Mustang was racing in front of me and passed a car on the shoulder and hit a tire tread and threw it about 20 feet in the air and I barely avoided it at 75 mph.
Unfortunately, idiots like this make it bad for the "safe" street racers who do it on a deserted limited access road or some other area where there are no innocent by-standers. I'll admit, I street race, but only when the only person I am endangering is myself (or my brother too, but he knows what he is in for). The police even condone street racing in the area where we race because it is off the main road and there are no side streets for people to turn on to.
Its too bad there aren't more tracks around for these people to race at. Most of my racing occurs on a track, and other than being safer it is probably more fun because you can see how good you actually are and see improvements instead of just being able to say, "My car SHOULD run 10's". Unfortunately, during this time of year almost all the tracks in the area are closed and the only place left to race is the street.

 

Also remember seat belts are the best safety feature. The dead and critical guy were EJECTED from the car. That's not good. If they were not ejected who knows? But I think that not being ejected is far better.