Sauber have revealed that they too were witness to a potentially dangerous Bahrain protest as they travelled back to their hotel in Manama from the Sakhir circuit. After four Force India mechanics avoided a situation on Wednesday night, the Sauber occurrence happened around 24 hours later.
Although the race track and its immediate surrounding area have not been affected by protests so far, team members continue to brace themselves for their journeys back and forth between the Formula 1 venue and their hotels in the capital city; the two destinations are separated by a number of villages where demonstrations are taking place.
On Friday, Force India withdrew from the second practice session in order to transport all personnel back to the city before night fell at 6pm local time (BST +2).
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A statement from Sauber described the happenings of Thursday night:
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‘Yesterday night at 20:30hrs a minibus of the Sauber team left the circuit to go back to the Novotel in Manama.
At 20:50hrs the 12 mechanics on that bus noticed fire on the medial strip of the highway.
The traffic was slow, cars had their hazard flashers on. On the opposite lane there was no traffic.
The team members saw a few masked people running from there over to their lane where a bottle was burning as well.
The minibus moved to the very right side of the highway and went past the situation. No-one from the Sauber team was hurt.’
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Following the opening practice sessions, the F1 community is now gradually leaving Sakhir to head back to its hotels. Tonight is expected to be the most hazardous so far as, in recent weeks, a string of protests have tended to follow Friday prayers.
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