Sakhir (Bahrain) (AFP)

"Just" burns on the backs of his hands, no broken bones: Romain Grosjean miraculously escaped the fire in his car after a terrible accident at the start of the Bahrain F1 GP, won on Sunday by Lewis Hamilton.

5.13pm, first lap, turn 3: the Frenchman from the Haas team left the track after contacting the Russian Daniil Kvyat (AlphaTauri) and hit the safety barriers at 220 km / h.

Its chassis is cut in two, gasoline is likely to spill, and a violent fire breaks out on the spot.

The images of this fireball refer to "another time", remarks Hamilton, a time when the F1s regularly went up in flames when they were damaged, like those of Jacky Ickx at Jarama (Spain) in 1970, of Niki Lauda at the Nürburgring (Germany) in 1976 or from Gerhard Berger to Imola (Italy) in 1989.

After minutes that seemed like hours, television cameras show the 34-year-old driver pulling himself out of the "survival cell" (the reinforced cockpit) of his F1 and shaking away from the blaze, aided by the driver of the GP medical car.

"It's a miracle he's alive," said former British driver Damon Hill.

- "Never seen so many flames" -

A single boot on his feet, limping, Grosjean (elected driver of the day by F1 fans) leaves the track of the Sakhir circuit in an ambulance where he obtained two of his ten podiums in the premier category, in 2012 and 2013 in Lotus with Renault engines.

Transferred by helicopter to the hospital, where he will spend the night, the French, who was playing his 179th GP and finishing what should be his last season in F1, suffers from burns on the back of his hands but has no broken ribs , as feared a time, indicates his team.

"I had never seen so many flames and an impact like this (53 g according to the International Automobile Federation, against 0.4 g at take-off from an airliner and between 0.5 and 3, 3 g at the start of a roller coaster, editor's note) ", says Alan van der Merwe, who has been driving the medical car since 2009.

"All the systems that we have developed - the halo (the arch which overhangs the cockpit of F1 to protect the heads of the pilots, editor's note), the safety barriers, the belts - have worked as expected, he welcomes. . Without just one of these elements, the result could have been very different. "

"Thank you to Doctor Ian Roberts (the medical car doctor, editor's note) and to the FIA ​​teams for their courageous and efficient intervention. We have always made safety a top priority and we will continue to do so," tweets for his part the boss of world motorsport, Jean Todt.

The team principal of the Grosjean stable, Guenther Steiner, praised the "speed of intervention of the rescue teams".

"The track marshals and the people of the FIA ​​did an incredible job", he insists after this "frightening" accident.

- "We put our life on the line" -

Immediately interrupted by a red flag, the GP (contested in front of rare spectators selected from among the country's health personnel) resumed only after an hour and a half and devoted the poleman Hamilton, in front of the Red Bull of the Dutchman Max Verstappen and the Thai Alexander Albon.

In the meantime, the Mercedes driver, who does not intend to ease off after being crowned champion for the seventh time this season, commented on the incident on Twitter.

“I am so relieved that Romain is doing well,” writes the Briton. “The risks we take are real, for those who forget that we are putting our lives on the line for this sport and what we love to do. Grateful to the FIA ​​for the efforts enormous achievements so that Romain can come out unharmed.

At a press conference, the Mercedes driver once again praised this progress and called for doing "always more".

The last fatal accident in the premier class is that of Frenchman Jules Bianchi, who collided with a crane during the Japanese Grand Prix in October 2014. French Formula 2 driver Anthoine Hubert lost his life in a crash with another single-seater at the Belgian GP, ​​in August 2019.

F1 remains in Bahrain next week, for the penultimate GP of 2020, but the race moves to the outer track of the Sakhir circuit, the second shortest after Monaco (3,543 km), its three long straights and its eleven turns only.

© 2020 AFP