The
2014 Japanese Grand Prix was held at the
Suzuka Circuit on 5 October, under intermittent heavy rainfall caused by the approaching
Typhoon Phanfone and in fading daylight. On lap 42 of the scheduled 53-lap race,
Adrian Sutil's
Sauber spun out of control and crashed in the run-off area on the outside of the Dunlop Curve (turn seven). On lap 43, Bianchi did not slow down enough to avoid losing control while approaching the
double waved yellow flags near the Dunlop Curve, lost control of his car, and veered rightdirectly towards the same spot where the Sauber had stopped. Bianchi collided with the rear of a
wheel loader that was tending to the removal of Sutil's car. Spectators' video footage and photographs of the accident revealed that the left side of Bianchi's Marussia car was extensively damaged and the
roll bar destroyed as it slid under the wheel loader. The impact was such that the wheel loader was partially jolted off the ground, causing Sutil's Sauber, which was suspended in the air by the crane, to fall back to the ground. The race was stopped on lap 44, and
Lewis Hamilton was declared the winner. Bianchi was reported as being unconscious after not responding to either a team radio call or
marshals. He was treated at the crash site before being taken by ambulance to the circuit's medical centre. Since transport by helicopter was not possible due to poor weather conditions, Bianchi was further transported by ambulance, for 32 minutes under police escort. The destination was the nearest hospital, Mie Prefectural General Medical Center in
Yokkaichi, which was away from the Suzuka circuit. Initial reports by his father to television channel
France 3, were that Bianchi was in critical condition with a head injury and was undergoing an operation to reduce severe bruising to his head. The
FIA subsequently said that
CT scans showed Bianchi suffered a "severe head injury" in the crash, and that he would be admitted to
intensive care following surgery. Among his first hospital visitors immediately after the Grand Prix were Marussia's CEO
Graeme Lowdon and team principal
John Booth (the latter staying by Bianchi's side even after the inaugural Russian Grand Prix), as well as Ferrari's team principal
Marco Mattiacci and fellow driver
Felipe Massa. Bianchi's parents arrived on 6 October and were joined, three days later, by their other children as well as Bianchi's best friend Lorenzo Leclerc, the older brother of his godson
Charles. Initial media reports in October 2014—said to be based on information obtained from
Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) documents—claimed that the speed at the moment of loss of control was recorded at and that the impact generated g-force|. This data had been sourced from Bianchi's g-sensors in his earplugs; however, it was understood that these slipped out at a crucial moment. Subsequent calculations in July 2015 indicated a peak of g-force| and data from the FIA's World Accident Database (WADB)—which sources information from racing accidents worldwide—also indicate Bianchi's impact occurred 2.61 seconds after the loss of control, at a speed of and at an angle of 55 degrees. According to Andy Mellor, Vice President of the FIA Safety Commission, this is the equivalent of "dropping a car to the ground without a crumple zone". There were several tributes at the race to show support for Bianchi: • Marussia adopted a "#JB17" livery on the cockpit sides of its
MR03 car (which continued to be used in the subsequent year). • Every driver wore a sticker on their helmet saying "
#17" ("We're all with Jules #17"), being an idea championed by fellow French driver,
Jean-Éric Vergne. • The drivers held a one-minute silence in honour of Bianchi just before
the next race. • The race winner,
Lewis Hamilton, dedicated his win to Bianchi. The day after the , then-outgoing Ferrari president,
Luca di Montezemolo, disclosed to the media that Bianchi had been poised to become the third Ferrari driver in 2015 if the championship moved to three-car teams, as had widely been speculated at the time. Following the Russian Grand Prix, Marussia's CEO Graeme Lowdon confirmed that the team would return to a two-car operation for the remainder of the season, however, the team entered
administration prior to the next race, the
United States Grand Prix. The team's financial backer, Andrei Cheglakov, later revealed that Bianchi's crash was a key factor in the Russian's decision to end his financial support of the team and quit Formula One. After the
2015 Australian Grand Prix in March, John Booth, now team principal of the newly established
Manor Marussia F1 team, paid tribute to Bianchi's point performance at the 2014 Monaco Grand Prix since the prize money won enabled the team to stay in Formula One. In addition, coinciding with the , Manor Marussia continued to show support for Bianchi with special red wristbands inscribed with "Monaco 2014 P8 JB17".
FIA reaction and investigation Following Bianchi's accident, the FIA began an investigation and also considered appropriate changes to
safety procedures, such as those at the
Brazilian Grand Prix, where the location of a tractor crane serving the Senna
S chicane was altered. The FIA released its initial findings at a special conference held during the inaugural Russian Grand Prix on the Saturday after the Japanese Grand Prix weekend. Among other things, it was revealed that Bianchi had slowed down at Suzuka's Turn 7, but without disclosing by what margin or the speed of impact, and that the journey to the hospital by ambulance took only an extra 37 minutes relative to the helicopter, without any adverse effects on Bianchi's condition. Further, the FIA confirmed ongoing research into closed cockpits for Formula One cars, the possibility of fitting protective skirting to all recovery vehicles, as well as ways to slow down cars in crash zones more effectively than double yellow flags. With respect to the latter, the FIA moved to quickly consider the introduction of a
virtual safety car – or VSC system – which was then tested during the season's final three Grands Prix in the
United States,
Brazil and
Abu Dhabi – based on a Le Mans racing "
slow zone" arrangement that does not neutralise race proceedings as much as safety car periods. The following week, the FIA reportedly emailed all teams to request that they retain any information related to Bianchi's Suzuka accident, for exclusive use by an accident panel established by the FIA to investigate Bianchi's accident. One week later the FIA announced a review panel to investigate the cause of the accident, which was made up of former drivers and team principals, and published its findings four weeks later. The report found that there was no single cause of Bianchi's accident. Instead, the contributing factors were found to include track conditions, car speed and the presence of a recovery vehicle on the circuit. The report also made several suggestions to improve safety when recovering stricken vehicles — which were subsequently introduced for the
2015 season — before concluding that it would not have been possible to mitigate Bianchi's injuries through changes to the cockpit design. The report also revealed that Bianchi pressed both the throttle and brake which should shut off power to the engine. However, Marussia's uniquely designed brake-by-wire system was found to be incompatible with the FailSafe so the engine was not shut off. Despite this, Marussia was not found to be responsible for the accident. In July 2015, Peter Wright, the chairman of the FIA Safety Commission, was quoted as saying that a closed cockpit would not have averted Bianchi's head injuries, while the Vice President, Andy Mellow, also confirmed that attaching impact protection to recovery vehicles was not a feasible solution. Marussia also issued regular updates on Bianchi's condition while rejecting initial speculation about their role in the accident. While hospitalised in Yokkaichi, Bianchi remained in a critical but stable condition, and required a
medical ventilator. He was taken out of his artificial coma in November 2014 and began breathing unaided, making his relocation to France for admission at the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Nice (CHU) possible. There, Bianchi remained unconscious and in a critical condition but more accessible to his family for their daily vigil. On 13 July 2015, Bianchi's father publicly conceded becoming "less optimistic" as a consequence of no significant progress and the lapse of time since the accident. ==Death==