2014 Japanse GP

Last edited:
Yeah, apparently the people in the right places are working HARD to keep the footage of the impact with a green waved flag under full track yellow off the web and media.

As of right now my link is still working.
 
Yeah, apparently the people in the right places are working HARD to keep the footage of the impact with a green waved flag under full track yellow off the web and media.

As of right now my link is still working.

Yes, thanks for that again.

Keeping it off the eyes of the people is somewhat right imo, seeing these pictures from Getty Images I can only shake my head... not only were those highly illegal (and now sold to pretty much every news station...), but they are also massively disrespectful.
 
Maddest thing is it would have been safer to leave Sutil's car there for people to hit than send people on-foot into the run-off area at all. Some shit needs to be reconsidered here.
 
I get redirected on bones link, thus I will leave this here, and just say: HOLY SHIT. That was no slow "sliding under" or "into" the crane - he LIFTED that motherfucker.

Also: GREEN flag? What the actual fuck?


http://gfycat.com/HiddenSleepyIceblueredtopzebra

JESUS H CHRIST!! Wow, that was just...
That crane is no lightweight I bet, and it bounced like a ball! Damn, hope he's alright!
 
Yeesh. Even without the tractor there, where was he heading? Through the gap anyway?

Also was it a full course yellow at that point? Looks like the green flag is being waved after the incident zone so that would be correct. The SC was only brought on by the occurance of the Bianchi crash, had he not done so we may have been green to the end, which, as a McLaren fan would've suited me fine given Button had just pitted for full wets and was looking good to make up a lot of ground on the Red Bulls, and probably re-pass them.

I dont think there was anything particularly wrong with what the race director did under the rules as they're written, apart from under estimating the chances of another car aquaplaning off the track in the same way Sutil did. I'll get back to that shortly. The Sutil incident should've been (and as far as I know, was) covered under localised double waved yellows which call for the drivers to slow down and expect to stop account personnel on the track. Of course it's pretty loosely interpreted by the drivers which is an obvious deficiency in the regulation.

In normal conditions double waved yellows would be fine so I dont think we need to be rashly calling for the SC every time there's a car to be removed but each case should be judged on its own. The Sutil incident and involvement of the tractor probably should've been covered under a SC given the conditions of low visibility, low grip, high chance of aquaplaning, etc.

A better solution might eventually be to implement some sort of Le Mans style system where in circumstances of double waved yellows, a speed limit is enforced in the danger zone.
 
Last edited:
And here I was, wondering how no camera had caught the actual accident. As we now know, this was not the case.
Holy crap indeed, that crash was violent. It looked much faster than I had anticipated, given where it occured.

I just hope Bianchi recovers.
 
Also: GREEN flag? What the actual fuck?


Also was it a full course yellow at that point? Looks like the green flag is being waved after the incident zone so that would be correct.

That is correct. If it was a localized yellow, the green flag is just after the incident, so this is correct. The previous station would have been showing the yellow, covering the zone until the first station after the incident, in this case what we see waving in the gif.

That distinction is often lost even on riders and race commentators. I've seen WSBK riders bitching about a green flag being waved near an incident, when it was actually at the station right after the actual incident. Kinda scary to think they would not understand that at their level.
 
Making a tractor like that which weighs god knows how many tons move like that is scary.
 
The most obvious step to review is the timing of the crane intervention : why was it release before all the traffic had joined up behind the safety car.

I do think that the if a crane is needed, if it's wet, the sc should come out.
I doubt there is need for it when it's dry.

My question is : why bother with a crane at all? the driver was safely out, and it was 7 laps to go... Even if Bianchi had hit Sutils car he would have been better off. And IF you're going to move the car, wait until the field has passed?

I get redirected on bones link, thus I will leave this here, and just say: HOLY SHIT. That was no slow "sliding under" or "into" the crane - he LIFTED that motherfucker.

Also: GREEN flag? What the actual fuck?

http://gfycat.com/HiddenSleepyIceblueredtopzebra

The realtime video is even scarier, he went in with a LOT of speed. That may even have helped, as the truck lifted from impact, perhaps missing his head slightly
 
Last edited:
This incident on Suzuka brings a lot of questions in the safety area:

1. Why on earth they are still using Cat or JCB as recovery vehicles still? When in street circuits they are using the massive cranes to pull out the stranded cars from the track. That should be mandatory in all circuits

2. Why Charlie Whiting, when the Sutil incident happened one lap before, dictated a FCY with safety car? More to protect the marshalls and the JCB that we're in the side of the graveltrap

3. Yeah, the conditions worsened a bit just before the Sutil off (See Button pitting for Full Wets, alas the rest waited a couple of laps to change for Inters again). But it wasn't Fuji 08 or Malaysia 09 where the puddles of standing water were heavy in some parts of the track, causing the cars to acquaplane in slow speed.

Those and many questions are still unanswered. And it will be a long long time

Forza Jules
 
Last edited:
This incident on Suzuka brings a lot of questions in the safety area:

1. Why on earth they are still using Cat or JCB as recovery vehicles still? When in street circuits they are using the massive cranes to pull out the stranded cars from the track. That should be mandatory in all circuits

2. Why Charlie Whiting, when the Sutil incident happened one lap before, dictated a FCY with safety car? More to protect the marshalls and the JCB that we're in the side of the graveltrap

3. Yeah, the conditions worsened a bit just before the Sutil off (See Button pitting for Full Wets, alas the rest waited a couple of laps to change for Inters again). But it wasn't Fuji 08 or Malaysia 09 where the puddles of standing water were heavy in some parts of the track, causing the cars to acquaplane in slow speed.

Those and many questions are still unanswered. And it will be a long long time

Forza Jules

1. It would be completely impractical to cover most tracks with stationary cranes. Monaco is an extremely compact track and no car will ever be far from a barrier. The amount of cranes required at Suzuka would be many many many times greater.

2. If they brought the safety car out every time a car needed retrieving everybody would get very pissed off very quickly. It has to be a balance. That's not to say that the right balance was struck here but going overboard on it is not the right approach either.
The better approach would be to be more strict on yellow flag enforcement, especially double waved yellows. Perhaps change it so they have to show a significant reduction in speed around the accident. Also come down very heavily on anybody who breaches yellow flag rules. Of course Bianchi may have had a technical failure that caused him to go off but even so reduced speed can only help.
 
If it is raining and a car goes off in an area where a crane is necessary to retrieve it, if the corner is deemed to be hazardous because of likelihood of rivers running across it then the FIA should not hesitate to pull a FCY and call out the safety car. Simple as that.

And that's not hindsight talking, as soon as I saw Sutil hit the barrier I thought that is going to need a safety car because I know how dangerous that corner is.
 
Last edited:
God it's just...in this day and age we're still making so many mistakes in safety.

No way, didn't you hear? We attached dildos to the front of the cars, theyre safe.


It's worse than I thought. That's terrifying.

My question is, they try and try to make these cars safe for when they hit each other, the safest thing to do is to leave the car beached there. If someone slides out and hits it, that's what it was designed to do, at least more so than hitting a crane.
 
Last edited:
If it is raining and a car goes off in an area where a crane is necessary to retrieve it, if the corner is deemed to be hazardous because of likelihood of rivers running across it then the FIA should not hesitate to pull a FCY and call out the safety car. Simple as that.

And that's not hindsight talking, as soon as I saw Sutil hit the barrier I thought that is going to need a safety car because I know how dangerous that corner is.

But they are hesitating, I wonder if race control thought about the probable fan backlash (re: The Show) had they brought on the safety car because that would've been it for the race. The process is now so long and complicated with the delta times and unlapping of backmarkers that the race would've finished behind the safety car. So in a funny sort of way in order to make the process safer with all these procedures regarding the safety car, it's actually less safe because now they're just saying 'stuff it, cover it under waved yellows and hope nothing goes wrong in the meantime'. Same with the Sutil spin in Germany. If they're not going to deploy the SC then fine and good, but there probably needs to be better regulation of the double waved yellows to ensure the safety of the marshals and the drivers.
 
Top