Accident - May 16th - A23

what Williams discovered from the car's on-board computer " The crash happened on the second lap after a re-start.

Senna took a tighter line at Tamburello to ease the car's travel over bumps that upset it on the first lap.

But at 191mph, he was going faster than the previous lap.

Combined with the altered trajectory, that more than doubled the cornering forces on the car from 1.5G to 3.27G.

The car's rear tyres began to slide as it hit the first of two sets of bumps.

This happened, Williams say, because the airflow under the car was disrupted, combined with the higher G-forces.

The cornering speed of F1 cars is strongly dependant on aerodynamics. Any disruption dramatically reduces grip, and can cause a loss of control.

Just under 0.15secs after the car started to slide, the throttle reduced from fully open to 40% and the force going through the steering reduced.

Williams say this was Senna lifting off and trying to correct the slide.

The reaction time elapsed from the moment the car hit the bump is what would be expected of a driver of Senna's ability.

Just 0.04secs after Senna responded to the initial slide, the car hit the second bump.

This resulted in a sudden loss of front-end grip which, in combination with the rear tyres sliding, meant the car suddenly turned right.

This is crucial in undermining the steering-failure theory, as in that case the car would have continued straight on.

Just 0.18secs after the car hit the second bump, Senna lifted off the accelerator as he began to try to slow it down from 191mph.

By now, he almost certainly knew he was not going to be able to keep the car on the track and so was determined to reduce his speed as much as possible before the car ran off the circuit onto rough ground.

Four-hundredths of a second later, with the car already heading alarmingly quickly towards the outside of the track, the Williams' Renault engine was no longer accelerating after its throttle dampeners had done their work.

It took 0.27secs more for the brakes to start to slow the car - a delay accounted for by Senna's reactions and pressure build-up in the system.

The car decelerates at more than 4G while on the track, losing 54mph before impact.

The braking discounts one outlandish theory - that Senna passed out briefly because he was holding his breath.

Just 1.9secs after the start of the chain of events that caused the crash, Senna ran out of time and the Williams smashed into the concrete wall on the outside of the Tamburello corner at 137mph.

The right front wheel was knocked back towards the cockpit and a suspension arm pierced Senna's helmet visor, inflicting the fatal injury.

The prosecutor argued that a steering-column modification was not carried out with enough care and that the new piece fatigued and broke.

Williams agree there was a partial stress fracture, but say their data prove the column (inset) was working and that it broke on impact.

The judge said the prosecution failed to prove its case."

source - BBC

Richard

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Richard
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Button bashing in practice for another round of Daley Thompson's Decathlon, Tim Hobbs left Shakespeare to the monkeys by typing...

I'll rephrase that. Ayrton Senna's car used a fly-by-wire throttle which for some reason stuck 'open'. This caused him to hit a wall. The question is still unanswered as to WHY he hit the wall head-on. Any other incidental damage (suspension strut) occurred after Ayrton was clinically brain dead. Michael Schumacher received leg injuries from a suspension strut in a similar accident. The inherent stiffness of the carbon fibre monocoques used is unfortunately both a safety enhancement and a direct causal link in his death. However, if you don't want a massive outcry regarding inherently unsafe driving controls (and their gradual filtering down into mainstream vehicles) and an investigation that paralyses your sport for at least one season, you'd blame anything else you could too.....

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weallhatebillgates

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