McLaren boss Andreas Seidl was furious with Charles Leclerc after debris from his car compromised Lando Norris’ Japanese GP.
The Monegasque tried to continue after damaging his front wing endplate in contact with Max Verstappen at Turn 2 on the opening lap, going against an instruction from his Ferrari team to box.
It was on the next lap, however, after scraping along the ground on the straights, that the piece flew off his car and disintegrated sending carbon fibre flying into the cars behind.
“We obviously strongly disagree with competitors living cars out on track with entire front wing endplates hanging down, putting everyone at risk,” Seidl told RaceFans.
“Unfortunately when this endplate then exploded [Norris was] catching in our front-right brake duct debris from Ferrari.
“The brake temperature went through the roof so we had to box him to clean it and then the race was over.
“I mean he still tried and did a great drive in terms of pace also to get back but it was not possible.”
Images posted from the same publication also showed a larger piece of debris wiping out the right-hand mirror on Lewis Hamilton’s car with the Halo also perhaps deflected pieces from the Briton himself.
Posting an Instagram after the race, one user called out Leclerc on the topic suggesting he could have “taken Lewis’ head off…”
“The only part I could see lose from inside the car was the mirror and that’s why I was holding it down the straights to avoid losing it and hit somebody,” he replied.
“All the other parts, we can’t see them, I was aware I had damage on the front wing as I could feel it but I wasn’t aware I was still losing parts.
“Thank god nobody was hurt though.”
Leclerc was given a five-second penalty post-race for the incident with Verstappen, plus a 10-second penalty for running an unsafe car.