Williams catches fire

Williams' morning on day two of the Bahrain pre-season test came to an explosive end after a brake fire.

Nicholas Latifi was at the wheel of the FW44 when smoke started to appear from both sides of the rear of the car.

Soon enough, small flicks of flame turned into a bellowing fire emanating from the rear brakes, with the Canadian eventually coming to a stop with a spin at turns 12 and 13.

Speaking as part of the live commentary team at the time of the fire, Latifi's team-mate Alex Albon tried to hide his frustration.

"I think I know what it is, I know what we were testing so nothing to be alarmed guys," he joked.

"We were struggling with rear tyre temperature so we thought flames were going to help."

After Latifi safely clambered out and fire marshals arrived at the scene, the fire caused one of the rear tyres to explode, forcing a momentary retreat.

A delay of over 20 minutes to the session ensued with a specialist marshal forced to ground the car before work could take place to remove the car from the track.

It is unclear when Williams will get back out on track although there is a degree of hope for later in the day.

Via social media, the team said: "From initial investigations, it appears that the issue that caused the fire was quite minor, but became visibly quite dramatic.

"It is not as severe as the video footage might suggest, but there is fire damage to the rear of the car that the team need to repair.

"We’ll revise our running plan once we have assessed the repair work that needs to be carried out."

A small fire breaks out on the Williams car...

But thankfully fireman @NicholasLatifi is on hand to extinguish ?‍?#F1Testing #F1 pic.twitter.com/VJWDvehJPV

— Formula 1 (@F1) March 11, 2022

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