Lewis Hamilton has avoided a grid penalty for the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix after allegedly overtaking under a red flag during practice.
The incident happened in FP3 on Saturday morning – the final session before qualifying for the 2022 season finale. The session was briefly stopped part way through, after a large piece of carbon fibre flew off Pierre Gasly's car and landed on the track.
The race director red flagged the session so marshals could enter the track to remove the piece of debris. At that time, Hamilton was on a flying lap and had just begun an overtaking manoeuvre on Lando Norris, who was moving much more slowly.
The Mercedes driver then went on to overtake a Haas that was a few metres further ahead on the track. But then Norris reported over team radio: "Hamilton overtook the Haas as well under red flag." And replays showed one of the panels at the side of the track was indeed flashing red at the time of the overtakes.
But, in mitigation, he was moving quickly when it first lit up and had very little time to react. Furthermore, a second panel further along the track was not flashing, no physical flags were being waved at the time and there seemed to be no notification on the Brit's steering wheel letting him know the session had been neutralised.
Nevertheless, it wasn't long before it was announced that Hamilton would be investigated after the session. He was called to meet with the stewards at 12pm UK time to explain his side of the story. After a lengthy wait, it was decided that the Brit would not receive a penalty.
Explaining their decision, the stewards said: "There is no dispute that Car 44 passed Car 20 directly after the track was placed in a red flag condition. The driver of Car 44 stated that he was on a fast lap, he saw the red light, immediately completely lifted the throttle and applied the brakes, whilst checking his mirrors for cars following in close proximity. He stated that he had, in doing so, gone past Car 20.
"The stewards took note of the precedent in relation to the 2021 Dutch Grand Prix [Max Verstappen], where no action was taken against the driver under similar but not identical circumstances. The telemetry evidence was sourced directly from the live data available to the FIA, not from any evidence provided by the team.
"It is our conclusion that the driver of Car 44 took every reasonable action to comply with the regulations in that he immediately reduced speed in a safe manner at the earliest opportunity upon the first indication of the red light. He could not avoid overtaking Car 20 in this case and therefore the Stewards determine to apply no penalty."
