Hawthorn's pit crew had signalled for him to come in the next lap. He had just lapped Levegh (running sixth) after Arnage (one of the corners of the race track) and was determined to keep Fangio at bay as long as possible. Coming out of the Maison Blanche portion of the course, he rapidly caught Lance Macklin in his Austin Healey 100S, who had seen him and moved over to the right to let him pass. Putting another lap on Macklin coming up to the main straight, Hawthorn then raised his hand to indicate he was pitting and pulled across to the right (from Hawthorn's testimony). What caught Macklin out though was that Hawthorn, using the Jaguar's advanced disc brakes, braked hard enough to slow his Jaguar from such a speed in time. Collision There were two key factors regarding the track layout at that time – first, there was no designated deceleration lane for cars coming into the pits, and second, that just before the main straight, there was a very slight right-hand kink in the road just after which Hawthorn started braking. Macklin, who also braked hard, ran off the right-hand edge of the track, throwing up dust. Noticing that Hawthorn was slowing down, Macklin swerved left to avoid Hawthorn, whether it was an instinctive reaction, a loss of control from going onto the change of road-surface, or his car's disc brakes operating unevenly. As a result, Macklin's car veered across to the centre of the track, apparently briefly out of control. This put him into the path of Levegh's Mercedes, closing in at over , intent on doing another lap and in front of Fangio, who was patiently waiting to pass. Levegh had no time to evade, and with possibly his last action, raised his hand, warning Fangio, thereby probably saving Fangio's life. With his eyes shut, Fangio — with his own quick reflexes — squeezed through the carnage and brushed Hawthorn's then-stationary Jaguar in the pits, allowing him to pass unscathed. Levegh's front-right wheel rode up onto the rear-left corner of Macklin's car, which acted as a ramp and launched Levegh's car into the air, flying over spectators and rolling end over end for . Levegh was thrown out of his tumbling car and hit the ground, crushing his skull upon impact and killing him instantly. The critical kink in the road put the car on