Romain Grosjean believes a hit sustained during the first lap chaos through Turn 1 and 2 led to a puncture and his subsequent collision with Esteban Ocon.
The Haas driver was running side-by-side and battling for position with his Force India rival when the Frenchman slid into Ocon, inflicting terminal damage to the pink panther's car.
Grosjean was later given a 10-second penalty for the incident, much to his surprise.
"The only thing I can say about the opening lap is that I got massively hit in Turn 1," he said, with McLaren's Stoffel Vandoorne the most likely perpetrator of the contact.
"I believe I had a puncture on the rear left. I got to Turn 6 and lost the car, and I think it was just the puncture.
"Getting a penalty on top of that – I'm not super happy with it."
While his afternoon of racing was compromised at the outset, Grosjean still took comfort from his car's very good performance on the Pirelli's supersoft compound.
"The positive from the race is that the last stint on the supersoft, the car felt amazing," he sadi.
"Even though we had massive floor damage, it felt really good. We now need to understand why it felt so good and move on to Abu Dhabi."
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