Newey: What Caused Senna Crash

[TenEightyOne]

We all know the F1 community have been talking (and speculating) about this for years, but now Newey has given an interview in which he gives his own view of the accident causes.

Even more astonishing are his recollections of the time after the accident, including his hair loss.

 

[lbsf1]

Adrian Newey:
If you look at the camera shots, especially from Michael Schumacher's following car, the car didn't understeer off the track. It oversteered which is not consistent with a steering column failure. The rear of the car stepped out and all the data suggests that happened. Ayrton then corrected that by going to 50% throttle which would be consistent with trying to reduce the rear stepping out and then, half-a-second later, he went hard on the brakes. The question then is why did the rear step out? The car bottomed much harder on that second lap which again appears to be unusual because the tyre pressure should have come up by then – which leaves you expecting that the right rear tyre probably picked up a puncture from debris on the track. If I was pushed into picking out a single most likely cause that would be it.




Very intrequing, Senna is my favourite driver of all time, and the way he died did seem very strange. (cue conspiricy theory )

However Newey is possibly the most respected f1 enginner so what he said seems very probable, but still strange.

 

[TenEightyOne]

I've messed up the OP... could a Mod move it to Formula 1 please? I must pay more attention next time!

Thank you

 

[Omnis]

It's in the right section, you just forgot the Formula 1 tag. In the future you can make that kind of correction just by clicking "Go Advanced" while editing your original post.

 

[Pezzarinho17]

I remember seeing a documentatry some time ago about his death and an hour long study of what caused it. I've always thought it was due to the car bottoming out mid-corner, which momentarily stalled the downforce from the diffuser...

I find it really strange how years after this tragic accident we are still just theorising (from old, probably incorrect, documentaries or current engineers watching videos / studying telemetry) without a finite answer. Compare that to modern F1, where 30 minutes after a car has been written off (and the driver has walked away completely unhurt in most cases), the team know instantly that 20g went through a certain wishbone, causing that specific component to fail and hence the crash...

 

[Dotini]

I watched that race. And I was very suspicious of the Williams' rear suspension geometry that year. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_FW16

"The car configuration included a distinctive anhedral rear wing lower element, the effectiveness of which depended on a low outboard tail section, which was achieved by totally enclosing the driveshafts within wing-section carbon fibre composite shrouds that doubled as the upper wishbones. This shroud was removable in case it was deemed to be outside the imposed regulations.

Early season performance of the FW16 indicated that it had shortcomings. Specifically, the window of driveability/setup in which the car was competitive was very narrow. In addition to this, the car had a tendency of dynamically changing its handling balance (understeer/oversteer) for any given setup. The first comprehensive set of modifications to widen this driveability window were introduced at Imola. These included a revised nose profile with the wings positioned slightly higher, new aerodynamic end plates which were slightly taller, a revised wheelbase and a re-shaped (white) cockpit surround. Other cockpit changes were designed to accommodate Ayrton's desire to be made more comfortable in the car and included changes to the steering column design to adjust the steering wheel position in line with Senna's personal preference. This included welding an additional extension onto the steering column. [2]

[edit] Criticisms
The car was shown to have severe shortcomings at its debut. The FW16 lacked the active suspension and traction control of the previous season's FW15C, and suffered from a very narrow driveability setup window that made it difficult to drive until the modifications to become the FW16B. This can be seen when Senna, pushing to close the gap between himself and Schumacher, spun out of second place during the Brazilian Grand Prix, and by the identical spins in practice by Hill and Senna at Aida, with Senna commenting on the Aida practice spin: "I can't explain it. I was actually in one of my best positions at that corner when it went. It looked silly and stupid but better it happens today than tomorrow."

Senna commented as follows on the FW16 during early season testing:

"I have a very negative feeling about driving the car and driving it on the limit and so on. Therefore I didn't have a single run or a single lap that I felt comfortable or reasonably confident."

"I am uncomfortable in the car, it all feels wrong. We changed the seat and the wheel, but even so I was already asking for more room." "Going back to when we raced at Estoril last September (on testing the passive Williams at the same track 4 months later), it feels much more difficult. Some of that is down to the lack of electronic change. Also, the car has its own characteristics which I'm not fully confident in yet. It makes you a lot more tense and that stresses you."[3]

Patrick Head, subsequently removed a section of the chassis to give Senna more space. However the new passive Williams FW16 had its shortcomings. The car was springy and unstable, with aerodynamic deficiencies which the revolutionary rear suspension could not mask."

 

[Feschka]

I remember that day, and the day before as well, it really looked like a nightmare weekend. Everyone wondering "who's next?"...

 

[TenEightyOne]

I watched that race. And I was very suspicious of the Williams' rear suspension geometry that year. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Williams_FW16

"The car configuration included a distinctive anhedral rear wing lower element, the effectiveness of which depended on a low outboard tail section, which was achieved by totally enclosing the driveshafts within wing-section carbon fibre composite shrouds that doubled as the upper wishbones....

The car was shown to have severe shortcomings at its debut. The FW16 lacked the active suspension and traction control of the previous season's FW15C, and suffered from a very narrow driveability setup window that made it difficult to drive until the modifications to become the FW16B. This can be seen when Senna, pushing to close the gap between himself and Schumacher, spun out of second place during the Brazilian Grand Prix, and by the identical spins in practice by Hill and Senna at Aida, with Senna commenting on the Aida practice spin: "I can't explain it. I was actually in one of my best positions at that corner when it went. It looked silly and stupid but better it happens today than tomorrow."...

However the new passive Williams FW16 had its shortcomings. The car was springy and unstable, with aerodynamic deficiencies which the revolutionary rear suspension could not mask."

@Dotiini - that's an interesting quote, I'd never read that page!

I think I see where your use of emboldened text is going, and I have to say I might agree with you...

 

[NFSCARBON1]

Some of you may have seen this video already. Skip to around 6 minutes for the explanation of the crash.

I'd say that if the suspension had failed and only slightly moved (so it would be indistinguishable from crash damage) it would have cause the bottoming out.

 

[Ardius]

A rear suspension failure would have been much more dramatic (I imagine Senna's car would have spun on its axis with oversteer), and would have easily been identified. The same goes for a puncture, though a slow puncture like Newey suggests might be possible.

A front suspension failure would cause that kind understeer though, but again, would have been identifiable.

We still don't know what caused it, its not likely we ever will. The most likely to me seems to be a moment of oversteer and then the correction by Senna simply took it into the wall. I can't see mechanical failures being the reason as this would have been possible to identify - after all, if aircrash investigators can discover what caused some of the worst aircrashes, surely a relatively undramatic F1 crash would be easy? (in the sense that the car didn't wildly shatter into pieces and there was no fire, so all the evidence would have been available).
There is the whole supposed cover up by Williams, but then again we are getting into ifs. I don't know why Williams would want to cover it up or if they would conspire to kill a driver, it sounds ludicrous. So I expect if Williams have found the reason, they would have revealed it.

 

[Only_in_f1]

I don't know why Williams would want to cover it up

To save their skin.

 

[niky]

Well... there is already an admission that the car was tricky to drive... so I don't know any more of what you'd want to cover up.

Failures happen... and as long as you can prove that it was an unforseen one, then there's no legal matter to settle.

 

[Mike Rotch]

Admittedly its been a long time since I've seen footage, and I dont particularly want to see it again, but one item i recall that just didnt pass the sniff test was the angle of front wheels when he left the track.

This oversteer theory just doesnt stack up in my mind - the wheels looked to be pointing pretty much where ther car eventually ended up - to the wall. If he was countersteering/ or any steering, they wouldn't have been pointing straight off into oblivion.

 

[Grand Prix]

Possibly a steering failure combined with a slow puncture to "steer" the car off? That's one theory I've always thought about. Who knows for sure though?

 

[Ardius]

To save their skin.

Which is my point, if it was something like a common mechanical failure like suspension or puncture, surely Williams could have used this in their defence? It wouldn't have counted against them.
So either they couldn't find a problem or they were covering up a serious design flaw that they either knew about before hand or only found afterwards.

Considering Adrian Newey's personality, I'm not sure he is the kind of guy to live with the guilt of knowing it was a design flaw. So either there was no cover up or wasn't part of it, which is unlikely, he surely would have been the first to want to know what went wrong.

Admittedly its been a long time since I've seen footage, and I dont particularly want to see it again, but one item i recall that just didnt pass the sniff test was the angle of front wheels when he left the track.

This oversteer theory just doesnt stack up in my mind - the wheels looked to be pointing pretty much where ther car eventually ended up - to the wall. If he was countersteering/ or any steering, they wouldn't have been pointing straight off into oblivion.

On the onboard footage, Senna does countersteer a slight bump. We are not talking a huge lairy oversteer slide, just enough of a slip that Senna instinctively corrected it but in doing so took the car on a trajectory that sent it off. If you countersteer even by the smallest amount, you will take the car onto a different line. And in such high speed corners with that bumpy surface, I find it believable that this is what could have caused it.

 

[Only_in_f1]

Which is my point, if it was something like a common mechanical failure like suspension or puncture, surely Williams could have used this in their defence? It wouldn't have counted against them.
So either they couldn't find a problem or they were covering up a serious design flaw that they either knew about before hand or only found afterwards.

But fact is the data 'went missing', Im not being funny, that just doesnt happen. IF the story is believed and the steering column broke that is a serious design flaw and Williams would have been held culpable.

Considering Adrian Newey's personality, I'm not sure he is the kind of guy to live with the guilt of knowing it was a design flaw. So either there was no cover up or wasn't part of it, which is unlikely, he surely would have been the first to want to know what went wrong.

I think that is a ludicrous assumption to make. Imagine a person has just died in a car you designed and it was partly your fault for a botch steering job. Now imagine that person is Ayrton Senna. In the following days everyone involved agrees it was a blur, if somewhere along the line Frank pulls you aside and says 'Look son, the column broke. We need to say it didnt else we're going to jail' you say it didnt and stick to it.

To claim you think you know what he'd do despite i'd hazard a guess never meeting him is ludicrous.

These guys could have gone to jail and had their careers taken away from them and families.

 

[TenEightyOne]

The data didn't go missing, it wasn unrecoverable from the crash boxes.

Conspiracists rely on the fact that Williams had access to the crash boxes because Charlie Whiting handed them over to the team when they were recovered. Williams told the FIA the data was unreadable, the FIA visited to confirm this, that was the end of that part of the story.

The Italian Prosecutpr's technical report blamed metal fatigue in a poor weld on the newly-extended steering column for the crash. Williams always denied this and said that while there WAS wear and tear to the column it wasn't the cause of the accident.

We will, of course, never know.

Even if Williams employees know that the column was the accident's cause they'll never admit it... because then Williams Killed Ayrton Senna. Does that mean it was the steering column? Of course not!

 

[Ardius]

But fact is the data 'went missing', Im not being funny, that just doesnt happen. IF the story is believed and the steering column broke that is a serious design flaw and Williams would have been held culpable.

I think that is a ludicrous assumption to make. Imagine a person has just died in a car you designed and it was partly your fault for a botch steering job. Now imagine that person is Ayrton Senna. In the following days everyone involved agrees it was a blur, if somewhere along the line Frank pulls you aside and says 'Look son, the column broke. We need to say it didnt else we're going to jail' you say it didnt and stick to it.

To claim you think you know what he'd do despite i'd hazard a guess never meeting him is ludicrous.

These guys could have gone to jail and had their careers taken away from them and families.

Why is it ludicrous? I know as much about Newey's personality as I do about the details of this accident. So its completely up to you what you choose to believe in this case.
My opinion would be ludicrous if you had factual evidence, but the problem is there isn't much evidence at all apart from "missing data" and the Williams teams supposedly taking away the black box before the authorities got to it. What the reasons are behind all that, what they found and why the accident really happened we still don't know.
So I choose to simply believe what I feel about the whole thing and the people involved. Again - what is ludicrous about it? Why do I have to personally meet people to build my own picture in my mind? Sure, Adrian might be capable of it for all I know, but from what I've read and the way he conducts himself doesn't suggest to me that he could. That is all I have to go on, because without actual evidence I can't really see any huge suggestions otherwise why he would or would not.

To live with the knowledge that a design flaw on your car killed one of the greatest racing drivers ever and that you have withheld that information is no small thing, even when it means the end of your career and perhaps a long spell in jail.

My other problem with the whole thing is if the design flaw is such a huge problem that they wouldn't have been able to defend it in court, then it surely would have been a possible problem on Damon Hill's car too? Are Williams capable of running a car knowing it has a serious flaw? I choose to believe not so but I accept its possible.

 

[Only_in_f1]

The data didn't go missing, it wasn unrecoverable from the crash boxes.

If I remember correctly, going from the book by Tom Rubython, they downloaded the data onto a disc which then became 'corrupt'. When trying to recover the data a second time they were unable to.

Even if Williams employees know that the column was the accident's cause they'll never admit it... because then Williams Killed Ayrton Senna. Does that mean it was the steering column? Of course not!

That was my point when Ardius said 'Why would they cover it up?'. Of course they would!

Why is it ludicrous? I know as much about Newey's personality as I do about the details of this accident. So its completely up to you what you choose to believe in this case.
My opinion would be ludicrous if you had factual evidence, but the problem is there isn't much evidence at all apart from "missing data" and the Williams teams supposedly taking away the black box before the authorities got to it. What the reasons are behind all that, what they found and why the accident really happened we still don't know.
So I choose to simply believe what I feel about the whole thing and the people involved. Again - what is ludicrous about it? Why do I have to personally meet people to build my own picture in my mind? Sure, Adrian might be capable of it for all I know, but from what I've read and the way he conducts himself doesn't suggest to me that he could. That is all I have to go on, because without actual evidence I can't really see any huge suggestions otherwise why he would or would not.

To live with the knowledge that a design flaw on your car killed one of the greatest racing drivers ever and that you have withheld that information is no small thing, even when it means the end of your career and perhaps a long spell in jail.

My other problem with the whole thing is if the design flaw is such a huge problem that they wouldn't have been able to defend it in court, then it surely would have been a possible problem on Damon Hill's car too? Are Williams capable of running a car knowing it has a serious flaw? I choose to believe not so but I accept its possible.

I never said your feelings about the accident were ludicrous, I said you claiming to know what Newey would do was ludicrous. Don't misquote me.

Just going to throw this out there, I don't believe the steering column broke. My reply was too a post saying Williams wouldn't cover themselves if they knew what happened.

 

[VRracingfan]

There's a video on Youtube in which this guy makes a hour analysis of the crash. I'll try to find a link at some point.

 

[Ardius]

That was my point when Ardius said 'Why would they cover it up?'. Of course they would!

I never said your feelings about the accident were ludicrous, I said you claiming to know what Newey would do was ludicrous. Don't misquote me.

Just going to throw this out there, I don't believe the steering column broke. My reply was too a post saying Williams wouldn't cover themselves if they knew what happened.

I didn't say Williams wouldn't cover it up, I said why would Williams cover it up if it was simply a puncture or an ordinary suspension failure. They wouldn't need to cover it up as they are not really guilty of causing common mechanical failures. The team can't create or prevent a puncture, it just happens.

So I went on to say either they covered up a serious design flaw or they didn't find the problem and then stated I felt that Newey doesn't seem to me like the kind of guy to live with the guilt. I also admitted I could be wrong or that Newey may have been kept in the dark on the whole thing.

Saying the assumption is ludicrous is the same as saying my feelings are ludicrous, as they are one and the same. You suggested it was ludicrous because obviously I don't know Newey personally, but I didn't say I knew him personally, I just feel he isn't that way inclined. Its not like I said it was fact that Newey would never do it and as I say, I admit I could be wrong and that there are many possible reasons why Newey has never admitted guilt. If I had tried to portray it as fact, then it would be ludicrous.
I apologise if I gave the impression it was fact and I hope I have made it clear now.

 

[TenEightyOne]

I genuinely believe that all the likely causes have been identified; both by the fans and by the knowledgeable insiders.

I also believe that not a single one of those people knows for sure... and they never will.

 

[Rhporter]

It is obvious that Ayrton's crash was caused by multiple factors.
F1 did not allow traction control and other systems that would have made the cars safer.
Also because of this yes Ayrton's car lost traction bottomed out and the rear stepped out. But it is also clear that a very poor and ill advised adjustment to the steering column contributed much to the crash. It is clear the steering column fractured at some point most likely enough before the cash to impair Ayrton's ability to control the car. It is clear from photos that the extension sleeve used to lengthen the steering column was a much thinner and smaller diameter than should have been used and was much weaker. The fact is that is the exact point that the steering wheel fractured. It is clear from video that the front wheels never moved to correct the slide.

This is what caused Ayrton's death.