Pierre Gasly says AlphaTauri will be able to address the cause of the brief fire he experienced in the pits during practice.
The fire occured on his car’s airbox as he was being pushed back into the pits following a run in second practice. It was quickly extinguished with assistance from Aston Martin’s mechanics, and Gasly jumped out of his car’s cockpit unharmed.“It’s all part of the practice, seeing how strong the engine is in these hot conditions,” he said afterwards. “No it wasn’t ideal, I got slightly hot.
“When we connected to the fuel breather it caught fire but we could switch it off and restart again so just a bit of a barbecue feeling but it was nothing too bad in the end.”
AlphaTauri will be able to adapt their working practice to avoid a repeat of the problem in the Singapore heat, said Gasly. “It’s just a procedure, just in these conditions because it’s so warm. But nothing worrying or concerning for the rest of the weekend.”
Gasly was able to continue and ended the session in 14th place. He’s a fan of the Singapore track but admitted he is dissatisfied with his car’s performance.
“I’m loving this track,” he said. “It’s a really special place, very technical, a lot of rhythm.
“On the performance side, no, I don’t think we’re really happy. We’re finishing quite far away in FP2. At the moment I don’t have the pace for the top ten so we need to find something for tomorrow.”
The team has introduced a small update to its front wing this weekend which Gasly said was “a minor change – so far we need to spend a bit more time to analyse it.”
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jff
30th September 2022, 17:26
Cool to see the Aston Martin mechanic extinguish the fire and leisurely walking back to his garage.
Jim from US (@jimfromus)
1st October 2022, 0:05
Alpha Tauri crew didn’t put out the fire because they didn’t want to use one of their extinguishers because it would go against their budget cap.