Retired MSU professor Robert Hubbard has been inducted into the Sports Car Club of America Hall of Fame for developing a safety device credited with saving the lives of numerous race car drivers.

Hubbard and his brother-in-law, Jim Downing ,developed the Head and Neck Support device in the mid-1980s after a friend died of a skull fracture.

Hubbard and Downing saw racers being killed because their torsos were restrained in accidents but their heads were not. This caused basilar skull fractures, which was the most common cause of driver deaths.

With a research background in skull bone strength, head injury and crash dummy development, Hubbard conceived of the HANS device, which restrains the helmet and head relative to the shoulders and effectively reduces the head motions and neck tensions that injure racers.

Since 1990, more than 200,000 of Hubbard’s devices have been put to use in race cars.

“It’s extremely gratifying to know that something I’ve worked on for almost 20 years has become truly beneficial,” Hubbard said in a statement.

Hubbard was inducted into the Kansas City-based hall of fame on Saturday.

Olivia Dimmer