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when World Champion Ayrton Senna crashed and was killed in the race that afternoon.

Examination of Senna's vehicle found a furled up Austrian flag that Ayrton had hoped to show on the podium at the end of the race in honour of the young Austrian. The F1 world was reeling from the double tragedy at Imola. There had been no fatal crashes in an F1 car since 1986 when Elio de Angelis had been killed in a testing session. The last fatal accident at an actual Grand Prix meeting had been at the Canadian Grand Prix in 1982 when Richard Paletti crashed and died.

With Ayrton's death Roland's was overshadowed. While many drivers and fans attended the World Champion's funeral in Brazil the Austrian's funeral was an altogether quieter affair. The FIA chairman Max Mosley did attend Ratzenberger's funeral. At a later press conference Mr. Mosley said "Roland had been forgotten. So I went to his funeral because everyone went to Senna's. I thought it was important that somebody went to his."

Roland was well liked by his team, his rival drivers and the motor racing fans. The motor racing world honoured its fallen drivers at the next Grand Prix in the1994 season which was held in Monaco. The front two places on the grid were left empty. In the place of the cars two flags were painted on the track, the Austrian and Brazilian flags took the places of Ratzenberger and Senna.

The Simtek team continued to race for the rest of the season and on the cars' air box was painted the words "For Roland". Eddie Irvine replaced Roland as one of the drivers of the SARD teams Toyota at Le Mans in 1994 but as a tribute to their dead driver the team did not paint out Roland's name on the car to replace it with Eddies.

Since that tragic weekend the Grand Prix Drivers' Association has continued to campaign for safety measures for its members. There have been no fatal F1 accidents since those of Roland and Ayrton. In 2001 the use of the HANS device was mandated for all F1 drivers. The HANS device is designed to save a driver from the type of injury that killed Roland Ratzenberger.

Roland Ratzenberger - July 4 1960 - April 30 1994 - R.I.P.

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