The Monte Carlo Rally service park has suffered significant damage after a storm blew through the Gap area on Friday night.
Many of the World Rally Championship teams’ service park structures have been damaged, including Toyota Gazoo Racing and M-Sport. Hyundai’s sizeable, two-storey building is understood to have withstood the gale-force winds.
The teams have called personnel back into the service park in an effort to secure and rebuild structures ahead of the start of leg three, which is just hours away.
One source said: “It was an incredible noise to hear the wind coming through. Some of the tents and easy-ups were the first to go, they were just picked up and flew, but then some of the bigger buildings were losing panels and roof sections.
“It was incredibly scary. There’s going to be some amount of work to do in there now before the cars come in in the morning.”
DirtFish understands the wind is still gusting around 60mph in the Hautes-Alpes region and those winds could continue into the night.
A further source added: “We have to be glad this came later in the night when there were less people. OK, we know we don’t have the spectator in the service park [because of COVID-19 restrictions] but this could have been a dangerous situation to be in the middle of!”
