Ott Tänak wants the FIA to launch an independent investigation into what happened during SS14 of Rally Latvia, where an arch collapsed in the middle of the road and Tänak was not warned before arriving on the scene and collecting it with his car.
Elfyn Evans suffered a wild moment on the 14th special stage, Vecpils 2, after running off-line. The rear of the Welshman’s Yaris stepped out of the clean line and took out some small advertising boards, prompting Evans to snap the car back to avoid felling an inflatable arch.
But in doing so Evans damaged the supporting structure for the arch on one side, and by the time Tänak, the next car on the scene, approached, the arch was deflated in the middle of the road.
However the Hyundai driver wasn’t notified beforehand via the in-car RallySafe system, nor was he slowed down, meaning he had no choice but to drive through it.
In the end the arch became entangled within his i20 N Rally1, causing the stage to be red-flagged before resuming again later.
Tänak was apoplectic that race control did not red-flag the stage before he arrived, and has asked world motorsport’s governing body, the FIA, to look into why what happened, happened.
“I really hope that FIA will put an independent investigation together to really understand what happened,” Tänak told DirtFish.
“And hopefully, yeah… I mean we definitely need to modernize the safety while the participants are racing.
“I hope it goes this way.”
Tänak’s stage-end comments were spiky, sarcastically congratulating race control and hoping they enjoyed their dinner and wine. Hyundai team principal Cyril Abiteboul hopes the “tension” created from those comments is viewed with appropriate context, and that rallying collaboratively works together to investigate the incident.
“I don’t want at this point in time to add any further comment, but what we’d like as a team, and I’m sure, like, all of the rally community, is simply to understand how in a world of connectivity, of instantaneous information flow, [how] it’s not possible to know when something is blocking the road,” Abiteboul told DirtFish.
Though Hyundai team principal Abiteboul was more measured in his comments than Tänak, he still supported the 2019 world champion's call for further investigation into the incident
“It’s very clear that there was absolutely no escape for Ott, nowhere to go. I think we are all lucky that it was not in a more dangerous place, not close to trees or at the exit of a corner.
“I think there was enough time for him to slow down the car enough, such that there was only damage to the bodywork. But first and foremost, I know that there is a little bit of tension in relation to his end of stage comments. I really invite everyone to put that to the side and to really focus on the substance, which is: how could this happen and how can we make sure it doesn’t happen in the future?
“Again, the car that we are advertising, the i20, is a car that is massively connected. You know, I can remote control this car from my phone anywhere in the world. And here we have zero information.
“If it’s dependent on a plane that was not capable of flying today, there must be redundancy in the system,” Abiteboul added, referencing WRC TV’s relay airplane which was not airborne in the afternoon due to a technical issue.
“And that’s simply what I’m calling for: without tension, without arrogance, simply collaborative work in order to make sure that we can guarantee the safety of the competitors at any time.”
Tänak dragged the fallen arch several meters down the road after collecting it
DirtFish contacted the event for a response, asking what exactly happened and why the stage was not stopped, and received the following response:
“Car number 33 left the stage, damaging the supports of an inflatable branding arch towards the end of SS14 on Saturday afternoon at Tet Rally Latvia.
“It was clear there was damage to the arch and two staff, positioned specifically to ensure the safety of the arch, moved immediately to remove it from the road.
“They were not able to do this prior to the arrival of car number 8.”
