5 July 1997 Prosecution won the 17th round of the Senna trial.
With the help of Cineca, specialist in elaboration of digital images,
magistrate Passarini re-examined the images from Senna's camera. These
are the same images already shown, but they are now in better in
Betacam. Two fixed points on Senna's steering wheel are identified to
follow their movement: a yellow button and a V-shaped mark. The button
is 83 mm away from the centre of the steering wheel and the V-shaped
mark is 55 mm away. The arches of the movement of the two points are
drawn in two moments of the race, the phase following the safety car and
immediately before the crash. Then the magistarte showed a new video,
taken during the practice session. In this it can seen that the
circompherence drwn by the yellow button corresponds with the movement
of the car body, while just before the crash the yellow button goes down
to the same level as the V-shaped mark, with a displacement of 28 mm.
Magistrate Passarini commented that the images are very clear and that
the yellow button obviously moved that much as a consequence of a
unusual situation. The Williams technician had said that 13-155 mm
would be enough to break the steering column.
Williams tried a reinterpretation. Dominioni showed a video taken from
the team's museum: the steering wheel of the spare car can be seens with
a flexibility of 15 mm. Forghieri commented that any driver would
refuse to drive with such an unstable steering wheel. Stirano, Williams
expert, replied that the the on-board cameras are not completely fixed,
so that measurements taken from them are not very precise. Moreover,
setups and weights change between practice sessions and races.
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