The 2019 Spa-Francorchamps FIA Formula 2 round was scheduled as the ninth of the season, supporting the Belgian Grand Prix weekend. Nyck de Vries had qualified on pole position, holding a thirty-point championship lead over Nicholas Latifi. Twenty drivers representing ten teams entered the event.
On the second lap of the feature race, Giuliano Alesi, driving for Trident, spun into the barriers while navigating the Eau Rouge–Raidillon complex. A subsequent FIA investigation determined that earlier contact with another car had caused Alesi to lose pressure in a rear tyre. His car bounced back onto the circuit at the exit of the corner, creating an obstruction for drivers immediately behind him.
Ralph Boschung, Anthoine Hubert, and Jordan King were running eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth at the time. Boschung cleared Alesi's Trident by taking to the tarmac run-off. King was able to slow in time. Hubert attempted to go to the right of Boschung but made contact with the Trident's right-rear wheel, puncturing Boschung's tyre and losing his own front wing. Hubert's car then continued along the run-off and crashed into a tyre barrier, the impact rotating the car until it sat perpendicular to the racing line on the tarmac run-off.
Juan Manuel Correa, running fourteenth, was approaching Eau Rouge as Alesi's incident unfolded ahead. A piece of debris lodged under one of Correa's front wheels, rendering the car unsteerable. His Charouz car went straight into the run-off and struck Hubert's stationary BWT Arden at roughly right angles. Correa was estimated to be travelling at 257 km/h at the moment of impact. The force of the collision was sufficient to tear Hubert's car in half, exposing his body and ejecting his headrest. The front assembly of Correa's car also broke away, exposing his feet, and his car subsequently rolled over. Hubert's car pivoted and struck the tyre barrier a second time before coming to rest. Correa's car continued several metres further and came to rest inverted on the grass verge on the far side of the circuit.
The entire sequence from Alesi's initial loss of control to both cars coming to rest took fifteen seconds, as recorded in the FIA's final investigation report.
The race was immediately red-flagged. Medical staff reached Hubert within one minute of the accident. Both Hubert and Correa were extracted from their cars and transferred to the circuit's medical centre. Hubert died of his injuries eighty-three minutes after the crash. Correa was stabilised and transferred to a hospital in Liège, where he was diagnosed with a spinal injury and fractured legs. He subsequently entered acute respiratory failure and was placed in a medically-induced coma on 7 September before being brought out of the coma on 20 September. He underwent surgery to save his lower right leg, which was largely successful, with a long-term rehabilitation period of up to a year projected.
The feature race was not restarted and no result was declared under FIA regulations, as the leader had completed only one lap. The sprint race scheduled for the following morning was cancelled as a mark of respect.
The Verviers prosecutor's office opened a manslaughter inquiry on 2 September. Alesi's car was impounded by authorities as part of the investigation, forcing Trident Racing to enter a single car at the subsequent round at Monza. The FIA conducted a parallel technical investigation, publishing its final report in February 2020. The report concluded that there was no single contributing factor to the accident and that Hubert had taken every reasonable measure to avoid the initial contact. Alesi's partial tyre deflation following earlier contact was identified as the event that set off the chain of collisions.
BWT Arden withdrew to a single-car entry at Monza, preparing a car for Hubert's number but leaving it in the garage. Artem Markelov was named as Hubert's replacement for the final two rounds at Sochi and Abu Dhabi. Hubert's racing number, 19, was retired with immediate effect and was permanently retired from the Formula 2 numbering system from 2020 onward. The number 18 was subsequently also retired in his memory in 2021.
Formula One driver Daniel Ricciardo acknowledged that he had given serious consideration to withdrawing from the Belgian Grand Prix held the following day and suggested other drivers had entertained the same thought. Race winner Charles Leclerc, a long-time friend of Hubert, dedicated his victory to him. The podium ceremony was notably subdued; champagne was not sprayed on the podium in respect to Hubert.
The managers of Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps announced that a planned redesign of the Raidillon run-off area, previously scheduled for 2022, would be brought forward. The redesign added a gravel trap to the area with the dual purpose of accommodating FIM motorcycle events and arresting the speed of cars leaving the circuit at that location.
In the 2019 Formula 2 prize-giving ceremony in Monaco, the FIA established the Anthoine Hubert Award in his honour. The award is presented annually to the highest-placed driver in their first Formula 2 season, functioning as the series' rookie-of-the-year recognition. Zhou Guanyu was the inaugural recipient. The accident remained, as of the 2019 season, the first fatality for a driver competing in the second tier of FIA-sanctioned formula racing since Henry Surtees' accident in the 2009 FIA Formula Two Championship.