"And then, you're in the jungle" - Müller & Hughes describe accident at Formula E race in Sao Paulo

It was the first incident in a chaotic Formula E season opener: Jake Hughes and Nico Müller lost their cars almost simultaneously in very similar situations, sliding sideways into the wall and into each other respectively. After the race, they described the situation that led to an early end for both of them.

The start of the Sao Paulo E-Prix went smoothly, but the first crash occurred on lap 2: almost simultaneously, there was light contact between Lucas di Grassi, Jake Hughes and Sebastien Buemi in turn 6 and - directly behind them - between Nico Müller and David Beckmann. Hughes lost control first and slid sideways into the wall at the exit of the corner.

Then more or less the same thing happened to Müller after a contact with David Beckmann's car. He skidded sideways into the Maserati that had already hit the wall. Both cars sustained major damage and were unable to continue. As both the Maserati and the Andretti had to be towed away, the safety car was brought out onto the track.

A big crash between Mueller and Hughes ?

The two cars came together on the exit of the chicane. Both drivers are OK

The @Porsche Safety Car is out #SaoPauloEPrix pic.twitter.com/YxfGBHnUa1

- Formula E (@FIAFormulaE) December 7, 2024

"There was a chaotic scene relatively early on with three cars in front of me," Müller recalls on DF1 of his brief first race outing for Porsche customer team Andretti. "I think it was David (Beckmann), but he can't disappear into thin air either - except when he hits the brakes. I tried to get out of the way somehow."

"I don't think there was anything we could do and we just tried to avoid the chaos. But then you're just in the jungle," said the Swiss driver, explaining his position in the turmoil. "Then there was a slight contact. I flew sideways into Hughes' car, which was already in the wall. A lot of damage to the car, no points - unfortunately, it couldn't have gone much worse."

Hughes: "Tried to avoid the accident"

Hughes - also in his first race for his new team Maserati MSG Racing - describes the course of the accident in a similar way: "There was a small traffic jam in front of us: three or four cars were involved in another car's accident."

"I could see what was coming towards me in the next corner, so I tried to avoid the accident. Unfortunately, one of the other drivers pushed the driver I was trying to avoid into the inside wall, which threw me to the outside and I ended up in the wall. There's not much you can do about an incident like that."

The race stewards also judged the chain reaction to be a racing accident and did not impose any penalties. Müller and Hughes came away empty-handed anyway. While Maserati barely made any headway in Brazil - Stoffel Vandoorne finished tenth out of 14 classified drivers - Andretti certainly had the potential for more: Jake Dennis was fighting for victory until his brake failure.

"The car has shown our potential and we now have to make sure that we fully utilise it in Mexico," says Müller. The Mexico City E-Prix takes place on 11 January.