So I was thinking about this again today. How come Renault gets penalized for losing a wheel that did no damage to any other driver or team and Brawn doesn't get any sort of penalty for losing a spring that hospitalized and nearly killed a fellow driver? In both cases, there were gross acts of negligence from both teams. Renault failed to tighten the wheel down and Brawn failed to tighten whatever was connecting the spring to the car. Alonso's wheel did no damage and didn't even necessitate a safety car coming out.

Am I wrong in thinking Brawn should be penalized too in this case?

 

^^ I see your point but I don't agree. We all know that when these machines are up and running they are pushed to the limit 100% of the time. If you were to get penalties every time something broke they wouldn't dare to push the envelope as much as they are right now.

In Renaults case, I guess the stewards felt that they could have done something (probably just tighten the wheel nut ) to prevent this from happening. Which I somehow can understand, although in Brawns case there really isn't that much to do.

I might be totally wrong but I think that what happened to Massa has never happened before but what could have happened with Alonsos wheel we all saw last week.

 

I know what you mean Strebo, but how often to you hear about springs coming loose or falling off F1 cars? Seems more like something the team should've double checked during tech inspection before Q1 started. Then again, it could've been a defective part that nobody could've known about. I dunno. I was just trying to play devil's advocate a little bit in my previous post.

 

I think we are talking about apples and oranges here Al. Part failure (Brawn) versus negligence (Renault). I haven't seen anything posted where the Brawn part simply fell off, wasn't tightened, etc. as a result of willful omission or negligence on the part of a Brawn employee.

In the case of the wheel, I think the stewards explanation really says it all. There is a safety on the wheel that shows the axle nut to be in place, but wasn't. The tire man didn't hold up the car, the team did not inform the driver of the issue, or attempt to stop him from leaving pit lane, etc.