McLaren driver Jake Hughes crashed out of Formula E’s Hyderabad E-Prix in a bizarre and freak incident in which debris tore off his car’s mirror and left part of it lodged in his steering wheel.
The incredible incident occurred at two-thirds distance in FE’s first race in India and prompted the only safety car period.
Hughes’ mirror was damaged when struck by what was presumed to be a section of Edoardo Mortara’s Maserati front wing, causing a mirror tether to fall into his cockpit and wedged itself into the steering wheel.
The McLaren-run Nissan then clattered into the wall at the exit of the Turn 3 hairpin.
Hughes was angry about the amount of debris on the racetrack and the fact it didn’t bring out a race neutralisation, telling The Race that “it was unbelievable and unsafe”.
He also praised the Formula E car’s halo, saying that without one “it would have been a big problem” when the debris flew towards his car.
“The debris destroyed the mirror but it has this tether for the camera, so the tether was keeping it flailing around for 15 laps and then just at that moment at Turn 3 it fell into the cockpit and just wedged itself behind the steering and locked it hard right into the wall,” Hughes explained.
“I’ve never heard of anything like that before.”
Hughes was forced to start down in 21st position after having his group qualifying times deleted for not abiding by the minimum pitstop time midway through his group session.
That rule is in place to prevent teams spending on equipment that would speed up wheel changes between qualifying runs.
He had set the fastest lap of that session on his second effort when he stopped the clock on a 1m14.121s to continue his stunning qualifying form in his rookie season.
Despite the disappointment of seeing his times scratched, Hughes reckoned that the race itself was brewing into his best to date, as he ascended the order to run 13th just prior to the shunt.
“To be honest, it’s almost funny that I’m standing here now with what I feel like was one of my best performances so far in terms of a day,” he said.
“Obviously I topped the group and we had the issue with the pits, with the pitstop time, which hampered our result massively.
“But to be honest I was pretty comfortable in the race, really good on energy – which is something really positive to take from the race because I think we took a step forward this weekend and with my understanding of the Gen3 car.”
Hughes felt that he could have snatched at least a couple of points as he was following eventual ninth-place finisher Andre Lotterer when the crash occurred.
Better on energy than the Avalanche Andretti Porsche, Hughes reckoned that “maybe P9, P8 was on if we had a good run.
“You never know after the safety car as well if you can use your energy.
“Obviously the target goes a bit higher but we’ll never know.
“I think points were potentially on the table, which considering we started P21 was a credit to where we put the car, what we’ve understood with it now.
“Hopefully it’s something we should be able to carry forward.”
