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Did they ever try prosecuting Simtek for Ratzenberger's front wing failure?

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No, because it's believed it may be due to Ratzenberger's mistake the lap before. He went through the gravel trap at Aqua Minerale in his out lap, and it may have damaged his front wing, only failing later upon reaching the fastest straight line speed.

You are right about the risks, but engineering is all about designing parts to sustain certain expected loads during use.

There are two types of mechanical failures:
- Unexpected/unforeseen circumstances that subject a part to stresses outside of its design loads and/or lifetime range.
- Failure in normal utilisation due to bad design or repairs that didn't follow the right engineering practices and standards.

In the first case, failure is imputable to external factors that you can't control and these are indeed facts of life. In the second case however, for exemple if a weld is not performed as per correct procedures and quality rules, then court cases are opened and it's a normal thing to do.

Also, sorry but anything related to low tyre pressure or puncture is a load of bullshit.

Ok, those are valid reasons to leave the track, but for the car to continue straight towards the wall on the tarmac run-off despite being driven by the most skilled driver at the time? Without a sign of recovery or slide or anything? Only a broken steering column can explain that.

Yeaa because it was so grippy out there. It wasn't tarmac, it was concrete wasn't it?

Can't steer in a fast corner with a front puncture, watch any accident on an oval.

You know what I've always thought? Senna simply got sideways and overcorrected, and at those speeds he was only ever going to end up where he did, which is why he straightened the car up and got on the brakes as hard as he could, (you can stop a car far better in a straight line than you can turning a corner) had it not been for a freak of physics, he'd have walked away from it, just like he did in Mexico some years before.

I'm not saying the steering column didn't brake, but experience tells me you do not slow down as much as he did in the distance he did with a puncture, especially a puncture that is so deflated that it causes you to crash in the first place.

Senna was not infallible, he often made silly little mistakes, especially when trying to hustle a car faster than it was really capable of doing.

Everybody's entitled to their own opinion.

Wasn't there two absolutely bullshit conspiracy theories about it? I seem to recall that one was that held his breath for the entire lap and passed out, cause he wanted to commit suicide or some shit and I'm pretty certain the second utterly batshit insane one was that he was taken out by a sniper by some Brazilian concern or some crap like that. I remember there was a link on the old TBK forum to a site that had a whole expose' on the snipper theory.

Personally I'm more inclined to think it was a puncture. Lewis Hamilton's crash in Spain (2011?) had a similar car reaction, although Senna's didn't have the exploding tyre, but was at a higher speed.

I believe it wouldn't have been a lost cause in perfectly capable car. Once he straigthened it out of the slide, he could have ended many places: either steer away from the wall completely or greatly reduce the impact angle. There was time and space to do that, and that's what drivers do when they know they still have a couple seconds before hitting. Braking hard only comes later when there's no hope left.

You're right about the braking power, in the National Geographic documentary they showed telemetry data with up to -3.7Gs of braking force before the hit, that's almost the maximum these cars are capable of.

Yeah, this is two theories in one - one said he passed out due to holding his breath, something he apparently did a lot, and there was a separate one about committing suicide (the Truls1 Theory). It's all nonsense, obviously - you don't break that hard if you're unconscious or want to die

Something else I remember been talked about was that some repaving work had been done through Tamburello & it was incredibly bumpy on the normal racing line.

Because of that most of the drivers were going through slightly wider off the normal line to avoid the worst of the bumps. Senna however in the race was running on the normal line & right through the worst of the bumps.

You can see the difference in line between Senna & Schumacher here from the lap before the crash, Senna right by the kurb with Schumacher about half a car width off it:




Its noticeable watching that shot just how much Sennas car is bottoming/sparking & bouncing around on the bumps compared to Schumacher.

Low tyre pressures, car running very low to the ground, bumps through Tamburello causing loss of under floor pressure and downforce meaning car wouldn't steer. The perfect storm of issues with the worst result. The slow puncture is the only other plausible cause.

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I know this has all been discussed until all parties were blue in the face, but I have to agree with kals here - the car was visibly bottoming a lot more than other leading cars, and I think a loss of grip under the car to cause it to step out, combined with an overcorrection and poor track surface...

Damon has said in the years since that he can't rule out that Senna might have just made a mistake, which was exacerbated by driving a poor car past the limits of what it capable of doing. The same driving put him on pole for three straight races, and put him out in Brazil. The FW16 was a pig of a car to begin with, and both Ayrton and Damon complained of aero instability.

The best (worst?) conspiracy I read was the sniper one - the sum total of the evidence was a hole on his helmet seen after the accident. It was quite clearly just the hole where a closable air inlet had been broken off, but that doesn't stop some people.

Its physically impossible to hold your breath so much you pass out btw.
Try it, your basic subconscious survival instinct will kick in before you even get woozy.

Though don't know why I even bothered dignifying thay one by attempting to deny it tbh

_________________
RIP Birmingham Wheels: here's some of the crash videos I recorded when it was there:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIaKIE ... 5t9d5PvoHA

Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/paulhadsley

Because we're all adults here and it's fun to debunk silly theories in a rational way?

There's a million and one theories over what happened, the most likely ones are something broke or he cocked up, neither of which can be rules out. Most of the other stuff is just coincidence.

I've never understood people's desire to know every last detail of what caused it.

Every last detail? People don't even know for sure the main reason for the crash to begin with, lol

Why the car left the track is not really relevant in the big picture of things.

I think Italian law has a lot to do with it tbh.

Their "someone must be blamed!" attitude to accidents led to a lot of people in F1 with answers closing up and a lot of other people assuming there was a big conspiracy theory as a result (pictures disappearing from the on-board, changing details on telemetry etc )

If it had happened in another country perhaps there'd be a few more answers around when people aren't paranoid about saying the wrong thing and landing themselves in legal trouble.

_________________
RIP Birmingham Wheels: here's some of the crash videos I recorded when it was there:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCIaKIE ... 5t9d5PvoHA

Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/paulhadsley

maybe we should use TARDIS to go back and mess senna's gearbox so he couldn't move from the grid

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We will probably never know. If something on the technical side was wrong, the people who know that won't even think of admitting it. I wish Senna could tell us what really happened, but at least his death woke Formula 1 up, I remember seeing pictures of a modified Eau Rouge that year for example.
Also, besides de Villota, we haven't seen a death related to a crash happening in F1, although unfortunately it is just a matter of time...