Romain Grosjean says he is eager to understand more about his Bahrain Grand Prix accident, including how he retained consciousness throughout, in order to further advance safety in motorsport.
Grosjean suffered a high-speed impact with the Armco barriers, measured at 53G and 221km/h, which split his Haas VF-20 in two, causing the wreckage to erupt in flames.
Grosjean extricated himself from the survival cell and spent three nights in hospital due to minor burns on his hand and some discomfort in his ankle.
He was not cleared to return to competition for the rest of the 2020 season but was able to fly home to Switzerland, where he is continuing to treat his hands.
One of Grosjean’s personal partners, neuroscience company MindMaze, whose clients also include Haas and McLaren, is developing a balaclava to better understand what happens to the brain in an accident.
Speaking in an interview to promote the product Grosjean said: “The next big step for me to understand is what’s happening in the helmet, the brain.
“Physically we’ve seen that I came out intact, yes with some burns, and we can improve safety on the gloves that’s for sure, that’s a step. But also what’s happening in the brain of the driver?
“With MindDrive I believe on my accident we would have understood what was the interaction between my brain, my helmet, the headrest, and why I didn’t lose consciousness.
“In a 60G impact you should lose consciousness, even for a few seconds, but you shouldn’t be as aware as I was – and that saved my life.
“I would like us to understand, with sensors on the brain, is when there is an incident, what can we do better on the helmet, on the headrest, and safety [generally], so that a driver even with big impacts stays well conscious and well [aware of] what he has to do.”
Grosjean went on to praise the safety developments undertaken in Formula 1.
“The overalls this year have been changed for fire resistance, increased by 10 seconds, the regulations say 20 seconds, I stayed 28 seconds in the flames,” he said.
“The strength of the chassis is coming up, the monocoque protected me, I was still able to escape and get out of the flames.
“If the chassis would have been broken the legs would have been gone, broken, whatever, I wouldn’t have been able to stand up and walk out.
“There are many things we learn from an incident. In my case we are lucky I am alive, I can talk, and I remember everything.”
Whilst the Accident Inquiry is obviously releasing some of the facts of the accident that it is collecting. the real work should come from the Accident Panel which then expands that into the chain of events , the immediate and root causes.
Fires and head forces/injuries have been a subject area continuously addressed for both causal, prevention and mitigation measures for decades. The ‘systems’ change can be seen in changes of helmets with fire skirts and even air supplies from the 702 & 80s and the adoption of HANS.
I would hope there is little to learn on fire from Grosjean’s accident, unless perhaps a perceived reduction in fire risk has reduced fire protection too much.
What will be more interesting is how well FIA address the recommendations of the Accident Panel.
The Jules Bianchi AP had several significant recommendations, but there has been no public action on difficult ones like R6!!
Other accidents, even when FIA have claimed jurisdiction, such have Monger & Hubert have never released even a summary of the AP let alone recommendations. However some actions by FIA could indicate reaction to these accidents.
The problem is a modern safety management doesn’t wait for accidents but continuously predictively assess the hazards and risk and actions to minimise them to a tolerable level. If Jean Todt sticks to his promise, we’d see more probabilistic rather than empirical safety measure.
I also had a very high speed accident in a Lotus 62 in 1971, where I sustained multiple injuries, requiring a three month stay in hospital, followed by six months in rehabilitation. Even though I had over 25 skull and facial fractures, from the belts stretching and steering column intrusion, I did not loose consciousness or certainly only momentarily and distinctly remember the horrendous noise of the accident. It was only after the rescue team arrived and I recall an oxygen mask being applied, that I passed out from blood loss and happily remember nothing for the next 24 hours, although apparently I was conscious and lucid at various times during that period.