In drag racing, much in the same way of death and taxes, parts breakage is just one of those inevitable realities that comes with the territory regardless of whether you’re bracket racing or running on the ragged edge. But if you’ve got to break something, the last place you want to do it is with a customer engine on an engine dyno.

Fortunately, in this video filmed at Steve Morris Race Engines, the engine itself came away unharmed in the instantaneous explosion that no one, even Steve himself, ever saw coming.

The bullet seen here on the dyno is a 572 cubic inch big block Wedge Chrysler, sporting s Keith Black engine block, Brodix B1 cylinder heads, a solid roller cam, and topped with an Holley EFI Dominator with a Mike Moran-prepped fuel injection setup. Out front is a pair of F2 ProCharger’s featuring Morris’ own Provolutes.

This monster belongs to Darryl Johnson, who had it built last summer to power his ’71 Duster in the Unlimited category at HOT ROD Drag Week.

In the video, the abrupt failure doesn’t give a lot of indication as to what went south, other than the fact that it looked expensive. But the pictures tell a thousand words, as you can see the driveshaft on the dyno severed in two from the incredible stress it’s undertaken from one 2,000-plus horsepower dyno pull after another. According to Morris and Johnson, no damage was done to the engine when the driveshaft failed, which is certainly good news for both parties, bur rest assured they’d both rather not perform any fireworks shows like that one again.