Max Verstappen slammed the decision to restart the soaking wet Spa-Francorchamps race during which an 18-year-old driver died this weekend.
Dilano van't Hoff's death was announced on Saturday. The young Dutch driver was racing in the Formula Regional European Championship by Alpine (FRECA) when he was involved in the crash which claimed his life.
It happened on the Kemmel Straight in extremely wet conditions. He span and came to a stop after contact with another racer, before his car was smashed into by another who could not see him through the thick spray.
It was not a dissimilar incident to the one which claimed the life of Formula 2 driver Anthoine Hubert in 2019. That incident happened just a little earlier on the same track, after the infamous Eau Rouge corner.
The FRECA race on Saturday had been restarted with just one lap to go, after a previous safety car period. Speaking about the death of his fellow Dutchman, Formula 1 champion Verstappen questioned why, in the terrible conditions, the race had restarted at all.
He said: "We have to look at what we can improve. I saw some images from the race and it was very wet, so I think it was totally unnecessary to restart that race. You know that on a restart with so much water and spray, you don't see anything.
"People in the back have nothing to lose, so they're going flat out and then you get that kind of accident that shouldn't happen. We have to find solutions. We have to look at how we can improve the spray and we always have to keep looking at the safety of the cars, but at the moment it's just enormously sad."
F1 will visit Spa in just a few weeks' time as the last race before the mid-season summer break. Lance Stroll was one of several drivers on Saturday who called for changes to be made to the track following Van't Hoff's death.
He said: "It breaks my heart what happened and I think Eau Rouge at Spa needs some looking into because we've lost two drivers now in four or five years. It's a really dangerous corner and we say it every year. It's not fair what happened today.
"That corner has to change. It's way too dangerous and every time we go through there it's an accident waiting to happen. Today it did happen again and we lost a young kid. It's not fair."
The Canadian was visibly emotional as he made that plea, as was Pierre Gasly as he gave his own reaction. The news would have hit close to him for the Frenchman, who counted Hubert as one of his closest friends.
"I didn't want to look at the crash so I don't have the information on the whole situation," he said. "I think we're all shocked and extremely sad with what's happened. It reminds us of obviously very sad time with what happened with Anthoine a couple of years ago.
"It just seems wrong. We should never be in such position of losing young talents. So it clearly needs a review of what's happened exactly and making sure these scenarios never happen in the future because I think it's enough losing some talent in such a fashion and obviously extremely sad."
