Listen to George Russell’s Nerve-Racking Call For Help After F1 Crash
Russell could only hope he wasn’t hit by another car while sitting motionless on track.
During the final lap of the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix, Mercedes' George Russell was chasing down Aston Martin's Fernando Alonso, in a battle for sixth place. However, before he could finish the race, Russell spun and crashed into the wall. While he was OK after the initial crash, he was still in danger and his call for help that followed was harrowing.
"Red flag, red flag, red flag, I'm in the middle of the track!" Russell called to his team over the radio, hoping to stop the race. Once his car stopped moving after the crash, Russell was sitting sideways right in the middle of the track, just around the bend of a corner, making him a sitting duck to possibly be T-boned by another car. You can hear the panic in his voice, as he knows another car could hit him, at incredibly high speed, at any moment. "Red, red, red, red, red!"
Russell had every right to be terrified of sitting motionless in the middle of the track. During the 2019 Formula 2 Belgian Grand Prix, Anthoine Hubert tragically died after crashing into a wall and then being struck by another car at high speed. And Hubert was far from the only driver in history to be hit while motionless. I can only imagine how frightening it must have been for Russell to be stuck in a similar situation, hoping another car doesn't hit him.
Thankfully, no one hit Russell, as a virtual safety car was called and the drivers gently cruised to the finish line. Russell's crash was a frightening end to an already bad day for Mercedes, as his teammate Lewis Hamilton left the race earlier with engine failure. However, after a crash like that, all that matters is that Russell wasn't injured.
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