Fifth Gear - Accidents

Accidents

During Series 12, Episode 7, two accidents took place while on set.

• Tom Ford broke his foot and several toes when he crashed a modified Bedford Rascal van. Ford was recording a piece about drifting. He and co-host Jonny Smith were racing each other in a D1 Grand Prix style around a private track. After winning the event, Ford was performing a victory drift that went wrong, put his van (painted to resemble the A-Team GMC Van) up on two wheels and sent him through the windscreen into a safety barrier.

• BTCC driver Jason Plato suffered multiple burns when a Caparo T1 he was driving at Bruntingthorpe proving ground burst into flames. The car, capable of 200 mph (320 km/h), burst into flames at an estimated 150 mph (240 km/h). Plato said: "There was a slight loss of power, I looked in the mirror and saw some smoke, there was a slight smell of oil and then suddenly there was this intense heat. The car spontaneously erupted into a ball of flames and I was sat in the middle of a fireball." The presenter was initially taken to Market Harborough and District Hospital by former BTCC driver Phil Bennett before being treated at Kettering General Hospital. He later received specialist burns treatment at Stoke Mandeville Hospital. The incident was mentioned during Top Gear's discussion of the Caparo T1 the next year.

Both accidents happened on the same day of recording.