Senna to blame for fatal crash
 

Damon Hill says he believes Ayrton Senna was responsible for the crash that claimed his life in 1994.

Three-time world champion Senna smashed into the wall at the first corner at Imola on May 1, 1994, and died at the age of 34.

Hill, his Williams team-mate at the time, told The Times newspaper he believes there was nothing wrong with the car they both were driving.

"I am convinced that he made a mistake, but many people will never believe that he could," said Hill.

"Why not? He made many mistakes in his career."

Senna crashed at the relatively straight-forward Tamburello corner, and Hill believes his team-mate simply took the corner too fast.

"He was identified with pushing to the limit and beyond. He would often prefer to crash into his opponent rather than be defeated."

But he recognises he is tilting at one of motor racing's untouchable legends.

"These opinions are sacrilege in the world of driving gods. Ayrton was a great driver and a man with enormous humanity. He was not a god. He was as frail and vulnerable as you or I."

And he dismisses all the theories that something was wrong with Senna's car.

"It was not the fault of anyone else that he kept his foot flat when he could have lifted," said Hill.

Source AFP
F1live.com


He got a valid point here, but I know that 95% wont agree and will die saying it was the cars fault....

come on... just look at the videos from the accident and u can see the car went straight out... surely something happened in the car

ppl just willing to say anything to get on the news ....... :fist:

Hill doesn't need to be controversial to get into the news, he's already a multi-faceted star. However, even though I understand his point, and it is a potentially valid one, as Senna was known to push the limits of his car, his competitors, and the FIA itself, I still believe it was something wrong with the car, as clearly, in any recording you care to see, he straight-lines the Tamburello Curve and there is no way he would've done that under normal circumstances.

Well I have not very good english when it comes to specifics but i'll try to explain - Senna's car's steering wheel (actually the detail i dont know the english word for) was shortened few inches just before the race, to give Senna more space behind steering wheel (why? i dont know? perhaps he was driving a back-up car??) and therefore this part had a WELDERED part in it. But this WELDER was done so badly that it just broke down in Tamburello corner. So no matter how much steering Senna did, car just went on straight to the wall.

http://tanel.hinvestgalleries.ee/00.jpg

You're right about this. The cause of accident was broken steering detail i pointed out in my excellent drawing. :) but the cause for sennas death was front suspension piece that went through his helmet and gave Senna a fatal head-injury. Senna was one of the greatest.. R.I.P.

There is also this topic: http://www.motorworld.net/forum/showthread.php?t=9726

I do understand the point about the welding on the steering rack and I have heard about the floorpan causing uneven airflow which disrupts stability at high speed, but I think we do all have to bear in mind that Senna was still only human and he could have made a simple driving error. Thats the only point that Damon is making (I think).

Hills a Dickhead to be honest. A complete Tosser.....When he said that he wont regard micheal schumacher a champion till he wins a championship at the age of 30 something(i forgot exact age).
And when comparing the Aston martin to the 575M with clarkson, He said the cars handle nothing like a formula one car, How fucken smart is he, great comment there dick.

It is still sad, and painful to thionk of Ayrton Senna's death, even after all these years. The morbid fascination we all share surrounding his death and its cirumstances will mean that there will never be a conclusive answer as to how he died. Senna was a great driver, and a worthy champion, yet he was human too, and like all humans, was prone to mistakes.

I do not believe the steering column failure theory is the correct one. And i do not believe that it ws his fault alone that the crash happened. There was the issue of cold tyres, the poor aerodynamic performance of the F1 cars in those days when racing on cold tyres, traversing bumps and kerbs or the problem of bottoming out at high speed, as well as the severe mental and emotional pressure that Ayrton himself was under, due to a poor first couple of races with Williams, the death of Roland Ratzenberger, and the crash that nearly killed Rubens Barrichello.

In the end, regardless of pressures emotional or otherwise, he died of bad luck. That the car just HAD to hit the wall at a CERTAIN angle, at a CERTAIN speed, with other variables in the crash all having CERTAIN values that contributed towards that piece of suspension flying up and hitting him in the head.

I do not think for one second that if he were to have the same crash again, in slightly different ciscumstances, or slightly different speeds/angles, he would've died. It was a one in a billion chance that resulted in his death. Even if, in the end, somehow, years from now, who knows when, that it is finally concluded in some form or fashion that Senna was responsible for his own death, I dont htink he would have wanted it any other way. To be the one to decide your own life and death.

its a shame those cars werent as strong as today's cars. If u remember Burti crashing on Spa a couple of years ago(2001?), that was 300kph+, but he survived and is 100%OK now. shame so many ppl died because of their cars not being as safe as they could be.

I think it was an error in the car, i saw the vid once(dont wanna c it ever again) and i remember seeing Senna trying hard to make the car turn, but it just went straight on...

It was not the steering column, which everyone thought at the time of the crash. It broke off on impact. What happened was that the car was too close to the ground because of the saeftycar situation the laps prior to the accident. The tyre temperature had dropped causing the car to be a fraction lower than usual.

To get maximum downforce the space underneath the car needs to be as small as possible. That accelerates the air underneath the car to the maximum, causing downforce. The drop in ride height caused Senna to hit the roadsurface with the floorpan of the car for a longer time than the usual scathe at the bumps in Tamburello. That dirupted the airflow underneath the car and momentarily meant there was practically no downforce. Senna had to give opposite lock, but the car found grip again very fast after the bumps and the car went straight on into the wall. It all happened so fast Senna didn't even lift off. Remember, he was doing about 300 km/h there. The onboard computer logged every detail.

The myth about the disconnected steering wheel was caused by Senna suddenly going straight on and the fact that there's a ot of room for the steering wheel to move around. The forces were so high that the beam (not sure this is the right word) bent during these fast corners without breaking off. It's pretty normal in an F1 car for it to be a bit flexible, just so that it doesn't break when put under a lot of strain. That's why it looks as if it broke off in the onboard video shots.

Hill's statement is better quoted in the other link TT posted. Hill is talking about Senna flooring the throttle after the restart and steering the car right over those bumps on cold tyres. Because that is what caused the accident eventually. Senna should have been more careful, but maybe felt too much pressure to score some points that race and went for it full on. Whatever you're looking at it though, without the piece of suspension hitting his helmet he wouldn't have died, so Senna basically wasn't taking too many chances IMO. The thing that killed him was bad luck. But he did make a mistake which led to this chain of events.

Although I'm not exactly a fan of Hill I feel this is not doing justice to the things he really said.

As a addition to this topic I strongly recommend to watch Tiff Needell's - "Crashes that changed racing" video. Senna accident is also covered there.

stradale, the fact is that steering column was made shorter just before the race and that the weldered spot broke BEFORE collision with the wall. Experts (not me, but real experts) have studied videos and they claim, that it was clearly visible, that senna rapidly turned the steering wheel all the way to the left for as much as he could, but front wheels did not move an inch. And that was BEFORE collision with the wall..

:shock: :?:

I have seen the onboard vids and I don't recall seeing such things?

I do know that earlier reports determined that indeed something was wrong with the steering wheel. Later, that turned out to be false, because they had mistaken the flexibility of the steering column for something being wrong with it. As far as I know, the theory that is believed to be the right one is the one I explained in my post above. Hill's comments seem to corroberate that. I'm sure he's pretty much into all of this, considering it was an important moment for himself. Besides, if the broken steering column had really been the cause, the Italian court would never have acquitted Williams.