PARIS (Reuters) - A mobile phone call may have saved the life of a panic-stricken French driver who found himself hurtling down a motorway at 125 mph but unable to slow down because of a mystery fault with his luxury saloon car.
The driver called police to say the cruise control of his Renault Vel Satis had jammed while overtaking a lorry, and that all attempts to brake or put the automatic into neutral had failed, police said Tuesday.

The driver became increasingly sure he was about to die as his top-of-the-range model raced toward a toll station on the A71 motorway between Bourges and Clermont-Ferrand, the police officer who took the call Sunday said.

"He was panicking. He was doing between 180 kph and 200 kph (110 mph to 125 mph) all the time. He was doing 140 kph (87 mph) and then the car just accelerated away on its own," officer Patrick Majerus said.

The driver, Hicham Dequiedt, veered left and right to avoid traffic and even switched at times to the hard shoulder reserved for rescue vehicles, in order to avoid vehicles in his path.

"He thought he was finished. I'm not surprised he was scared -- it's not easy to go through a toll station at 200 kph, the gap is pretty tight," Majerus said.


Great day for a drive (http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=oddlyEnoughNews&storyID=6418334)

I find it hard to believe that his brakes didn't work.

Maybe the cruise control went nuts. Brakes should have been able to over-ride. The top of the line Renault, as with other $50K luxo barges, is loaded with toys of all sorts, may have had a real breakdown. You'd think the guy would have sense enough to take his foot off the accelerator & just put the car in neutral ...

Originally posted by es347fan
You'd think the guy would have sense enough to take his foot off the accelerator & just put the car in neutral ...

The article did say that he tried that, but it didn't work. Which I have an easier time believing. I figure that even if the car had brake-by-wire, which so far only Mercedes has bothered to try, there's no way in hell they'd let anything in the computer disable or override the brakes. I could see the car maybe not letting you shift gears at that speed, though. Hey Astra, if you hear the outcome of this let us know!

Renault today announced they are going to prosecute the guy for faking the whole incident. They say they checked the car and that nothing is wrong, and that the brakes show no evidence supporting the guy's tale.
But according to reports I read the guy seems sincere. The whole thing was closely followed by road police.
I suspect Renault tries to discredit the guy to avoid a scandal. Hard to know the truth anyway.

last news - I just heard on the radio that another man says he had a similar problem with another Renault, a Megane, in september. He was only stuck at 90 km/h. He said nobody at Renault wanted to hear his story. Seems the company is in trouble. I'm glad my Renault Clio is older than these computer controlled cars !

http://www.renault-kalydi.hu/pic_upload_nagy/im000002a.jpg

[QUOTE]Originally posted by astrapol2
[B]last news - I just heard on the radio that another man says he had a similar problem with another Renault, a Megane, in september. He was only stuck at 90 km/h. He said nobody at Renault wanted to hear his story. Seems the company is in trouble. I'm glad my Renault Clio is older than these computer controlled cars ![QUOTE]

Aaaarg!!!!!

I just got my Megane last month!!!
:bombout: :drive: :mad: