18 March 1997 Charlie Whiting (FIA representative at Imola in 94) was heard at the trial for Senna's death. He said that car bodies have to go through 7 tests before they are approved and 4 more tests before they are approved again after they are subject to any major modification. Modifying the steering column is not considered a major modification, so Senna's car was not tested again after the steering column was shortened.
About the black boxes, Whiting said that Williams asked for their box to be removed to make sure that there were no problems which could occur on Hill's car too. According to Whiting the Williams black box was unreadable, so they removed the Reanult box as well.
Marco Spiga (black box expert) was the next witness. He said that the Williams black box was badly damaged and the battery was missing. When asked by the prosecution wheter even in that conidition the black box could have been attached to a computer to see whether any data could be recovered, he replied that it was "most likely". At this point the prosecution asked that this be tried and the Williams black box be connected to a computer. The judge agreed and this test will be carried out at the faculty on Engineering of the University of Bologna on 24 March.
Last witnesses were Prof Romanelli and Dr Ricci (legal doctors). They said that Senna's death was caused by being hit above the right eyebrow by a long, smooth object with rounded end. They found extreme damage to the nervous system and that the front part of the brain had been smashed and that the base of the skull had been cracked. They also said that the section of the suspension arm was smaller than the mark on Senna's forehead.
Next hearing will be on 2nd April, when the witness will be a track steward, the Cineca camera elaboration will be examined and the conclusions of Marco Spiga will be heard.

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