Andrew Benson Motor Racing
Michael Schumacher broke his right leg last weekend at the British Grand Prix in exactly the kind of accident drivers have been warning the sport’s authorities about for some time.
The German’s head-on impact with a wall highlighted just how inefficient the gravel traps used to slow out-of-control cars can be under certain circumstances.
The problem is on a list of desired changes that the Grand Prix Drivers’ Association (GPDA) has presented to the sport’s governing body, the FIA.
Schumacher, along with the race-winner David Coulthard, is a leading figure in the GPDA, and has been one of its three elected representatives since it was revived following the death of the Brazilian Ayrton Senna five years ago.
The drivers now prepare a list of changes they would like to see at each circuit after every grand prix, and have regular meetings among themselves to exchange ideas.
But they feel that their suggestions are not being taken seriously enough by the FIA president Max Mosley. As Eddie Irvine plainly hinted at the end of the race: “One day, hopefully [this will change],” he said, after pointing out that a stretch of gravel that sloped upwards would have slowed Schumacher more quickly in Sunday’s crash. He said he had been suggesting such a change “for years”.
His words are unlikely to have gone down too well with Mosley. He listens to the drivers, but he feels that their understanding of a complicated issue is too sketchy for them to sound off every time there is an accident.
There were complaints after Schumacher’s crash that three layers of tyre barrier were not enough at Stowe corner, but that was not on the drivers’ list of requested changes after last year’s event, and no one mentioned it to the FIA before the race.
It is the FIA that has taken the lead on safety since Senna’s death, recognising that formula one would be unlikely to survive if drivers were killed regularly on live television.
A massive amount has been done since 1994. Increasingly restrictive regulations have slowed the cars down dramatically, and much more stringent crash tests have ensured that the cars are better able to withstand impact and protect the drivers more effectively in accidents.
Among other changes, the sides of cars’ cockpits have been raised to protect the drivers’ heads, wheels are now tethered to the cars to ensure that they stay attached to the car in an accident, and drivers are positioned in extractable seats to lessen the risk of spinal injuries.
Data recorders on the cars are analysed after accidents to see what can be learned about the way cars behave when they go out of control, and it is this which has highlighted the problem with gravel traps.
There is, though, no easy solution. For some years now it has been apparent that gravel traps do not work well in all circumstances. They stop a spinning car extremely effectively, but if a car goes into gravel straight on, its flat underside simply skates across the top. That is what happened to Schumacher at Silverstone.
A stretch of asphalt would have slowed Schumacher down more effectively, but gravel works better if a car is spinning. As Coulthard pointed out, Schumacher’s accident was out of the ordinary. “It’s unusual for a driver to go straight on there,” he said. “You’re actually more likely to spin.”
But improving safety is a gradual process, and inclining every gravel trap at every track in the world would be enormously expensive.
In any case, the FIA’s safety guidelines, painstakingly compiled after years of research, suggested the run-off at Stowe was sufficient. Nevertheless, some changes at that corner, which is approached at 304km/h, are to be expected next season.
When safety is being analysed with such high technology, it seems anachronistic that impact should be cushioned by layers of old tyres, but the research has shown that tyre barriers are in fact the best and most cost- effective thing for formula one cars to hit –if they must hit something.
Coulthard said another layer of tyres would have helped Schumacher, but tests have proved that three layers is the optimum. Any more, and there is a risk of a driver being injured by tyres hitting him on the head.
As a result of all this work, the cars and circuits are much safer than they were when Senna was driving. The Brazilian may even not have been killed had he suffered the same accident today – he died because he was hit on the head by his wheel and suspension, something the wheel-tethers have been introduced to prevent.
What Sunday’s events will have done, though, is remind everyone in formula one that no matter how much is done to improve safety, it can never be enough. Only on Saturday Mosley said: “There have been a lot of successful safety changes in the last five years, but nobody should be under any illusion – we could have a serious injury or a fatality at any moment. It is a highly dangerous sport. We can only do our best.”
At the time, his remarks passed almost unnoticed, but they take on a new resonance in the aftermath of Schumacher’s crash. The fact that the German has such relatively light injuries after hitting a wall head-on at such high speed underlines how far the sport has come.
As one insider pointed out: “A formula one car going straight on at 304km/h is about as bad a scenario as we can imagine. The fact that he only has a broken leg should be positive, not a reason to start recriminations.”
Andrew Benson is grand prix editor of Autosport
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