Raikkonen engine survived Melbourne fire

Mar.31 (GMM) More reports claim Kimi Raikkonen's power unit has survived his fiery exit from the Australian grand prix.

The Finn retired in the pitlane as a marshal shot fire extinguisher fluid into his flaming airbox, but Italy's Autosprint said Ferrari was always confident the actual engine would survive.

"If we had seen on the telemetry that it was a problem with the power unit," said team boss Maurizio Arrivabene, "we would have asked Kimi to immediately turn it off rather than have him return to the box."

Turun Sanomat, a Finnish newspaper reporting from the scene of this weekend's Bahrain grand prix, said the problem was traced to the turbo.

"Ferrari is pleased that an engine change is not necessary," it said, adding that Ferrari sources confirmed that the quick thinking of the fire marshal was instrumental to limiting damage to just the turbo.

Raikkonen finished second in last year's Bahrain race.

He said this week: "Maybe I could have won but it's pointless to start guessing things, we were second and that's it. It was not too bad, but I guess it could have been better."