Bamber was pressuring Neel Jani’s Proton Porsche 963 LMDh for third place with somewhat underneath 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 appropriate in a bid to attract alongside Jani, he clipped the entrance of Gelael’s automobile and speared his personal Chip Ganassi Racing V-Collection.R LMDh laborious into the boundaries on the right-hand facet of the street.
Bamber’s automobile grew to become airborne earlier than touchdown on its wheels, whereas Gelael made heavy contact with the boundaries on the left-hand facet.
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 can be prolonged by the identical 1hr47m length of the crimson flag.
The race is about to renew at 19:10 native time
“It might have been so much worse, I feel I am fairly fortunate right here,” Gelael instructed the WEC’s stay feed.
“I used to be simply within the center, the 2 guys had been combating in entrance they usually misjudged and generally the misjudgement can result in greater issues. I feel everybody else sees.
“We had 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 does not occur in Le Mans. Fingers crossed, full focus there.
“However it’s additionally an accident you should not take flippantly. 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 individuals do it very effectively, and a few individuals do it a bit much less. Right now was the worst half.”
WRT’s LMGT3 staff supervisor Kurt Mollekens stated: “It’s totally unlucky, one weekend shouldn’t be the opposite. We had been the heroes of the earlier one, now we return with zero factors each automobiles, massive crashes, a number of work to do earlier than Le Mans.
“We might have most well-liked to keep away from it like all people else would, however it’s what it’s.
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 operating 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 downside along with his door-hatch.
Shortly after taking up the lead from Julien Andlauer underneath a digital security automobile, the Swiss spent a number of gradual laps making an attempt to shut his reluctant door and was proven a black and orange flag earlier than managing to tug it shut.
The Bamber-Gelael crash was the second main incident of the race, with the VSC triggered by BMW driver Rene Rast tagging the again of Phil Hanson’s Jota Porsche on the run to Bruxelles and spinning it into the trail of Ahmad Al Harthy within the different WRT BMW GT3.
Each Hanson and Al Harthy retired, whereas Rast’s automobile was ordered to serve a drive-through penalty.
Repairs to the armco boundaries meant the race remained underneath warning for nearly an hour earlier than resuming.
The LMGT3 class is at present led by the Manthey EMA Porsche of Morris Schuring, who was shortly as a result of hand over to Richard Lietz.
#38 Hertz Staff Jota Porsche 963: Jenson Button, Philip Hanson, Oliver Rasmussen, crash
Photograph by: Paul Foster