There are few things more terrifying that fire, and being strapped into a race vehicle traveling at-speed that suddenly erupts into flames has to be a harrowing experience. Chris Cadotto, driver of the fan-favorite “Brick” Dodge Ram pickup recently had that experience at Milan Dragway, but luckily Chris suffered only a few minor burns from the inferno.

As you can see in the video, the heavy truck seems to be on a fairly solid pass when seemingly without warning, the front end bursts into flames. Cadotto, obviously blinded by the flames for a few seconds, released the chutes and jumped on the brakes. Whether intentional or not, the front of the truck nosed into the retaining wall, which likely helped scrub off even more speed, allowing Cadotto to come to a halt with all 4 wheels safely on the ground, where he quickly exited the truck.

According to a post on the Cadotto Racing Facebook page, Chris found that his shoelaces were actually melted to the floor of the truck and his helmet’s visor also melted off, which likely led to, as Cadotto himself put it, “singed eyebrows and a little burn above my eyes”, surprisingly minor burns judging by the video. Chris credits this to having the best safety equipment available, which clearly did its job well. The truck may be repairable, but that has yet to be determined at this time.

Cadotto was understandably disappointed to have the season come to such an abrupt end as they had just reeled off a new personal best of 4.16, backed that up with another 4.16, and had the truck on pace to dip into the 4.0 range when the fire ended their weekend and 2015 season. All in all, though, it seems like they had found something the truck really liked, so it seems like a safe bet that Cadotto Racing will be back in 2016 with the Big Red Brick ready to try for that magical 4.0 timeslip.