Bamber was pressuring Neel Jani’s Proton Porsche 963 LMDh for third place with a little bit beneath two hours remaining within the race when the pair stumbled on the battle for fourth within the LMGT3 class on the run to Les Combes.
With Jani delayed barely behind Gelael’s WRT-run BMW M4 GT3 and the D’Station Aston Martin Vantage of Erwan Bastard, Bamber had a run on the Swiss rounding the Kemmel Straight’s right-hand kink.
However as he moved to the correct in a bid to attract alongside Jani, he clipped the entrance of Gelael’s automobile and speared his personal Chip Ganassi Racing V-Sequence.R LMDh exhausting into the obstacles on the right-hand aspect of the street.
Bamber’s automobile grew to become airborne earlier than touchdown on its wheels, whereas Gelael made heavy contact with the obstacles on the left-hand aspect. Each drivers are understood to be okay.
With minutes left on the clock earlier than the unique six hour length was set to elapse, it was introduced that the race could be prolonged by the identical 1h47m length of the pink flag.
The race is ready to renew at 19:10 native time.
“It might have been lots worse, I feel I am fairly fortunate right here,” Gelael instructed the WEC’s reside feed. “I used to be simply within the center, the 2 guys have been preventing in entrance they usually misjudged and generally the misjudgement can result in larger issues. I feel everybody else sees.
“We have been going to salvage one thing this weekend, in any case we did not, however hopefully for Le Mans, it is the massive one which I hope it would not occur in Le Mans. Fingers crossed, full focus there.
“However it’s additionally an accident you should not take frivolously. I perceive these items occur and it is a part of racing, nevertheless it’s additionally one thing I feel very avoidable.
“The respect given between classes and the respect between drivers; some folks do it very nicely, and a few folks do it a bit much less. At this time was the worst half.”
WRT’s LMGT3 workforce supervisor Kurt Mollekens added: “It’s totally unlucky, one weekend just isn’t the opposite. We have been the heroes of the earlier one, now we return with zero factors each vehicles, massive crashes, loads of work to do earlier than Le Mans.
“We might have most popular to keep away from it like everyone else would, however it’s what it’s.”
#31 Group WRT BMW M4 LMGT3: Darren Leung, Sean Gelael, Augusto Farfus, #20 BMW M Group WRT BMW M Hybrid V8: Sheldon Van Der Linde, Robin Frijns, Rene Rast
Photograph by: Emanuele Clivati | AG Photograph
Ferrari was main the race on the time of the stoppage with its pair of factory-run 499P Le Mans Hypercars.
Alessandro Pier Guidi within the #51 entry was main Antonio Fuoco within the #50 automobile that was disqualified from qualifying for working underweight and had been demoted to the again of the grid.
Each had overtaken the privateer Proton Porsche that had led in Jani’s fingers at half-distance, regardless of a weird drawback together with his door-hatch.
The clock continues to tick down as obstacles are repaired on the Kemmel Straight.
#51 Ferrari AF Corse Ferrari 499P: Alessandro Pier Guidi, James Calado, Antonio Giovinazzi
Photograph by: Emanuele Clivati | AG Photograph
Each Hanson and Al Harthy retired, whereas Rast’s automobile was ordered to serve a drive-through penalty.
Repairs to the armco obstacles meant the race remained beneath warning for nearly an hour earlier than resuming.