Radar stops car doing Mach 3

7 April 2004

BRUSSELS - A police radar in Brussels recently stopped a car travelling at three times the speed of sound, newspaper La Derniere Heure reported on Wednesday.

The incident happened in December but has only just come to light, the newspaper said.

Apparently the car, a standard mini, was 'flashed' by the radar when it drove too quickly along the Boulevard Lambermont in the Brussels suburb of Schaerbeek.

However, when police retrieved the necessary data from the radar in order to fine the errant motorist, they were more than a little surprised.

According to the device, the car had been travelling at 3,381 kilometres per hour, or over three times the speed of sound.

"We called the local police to find out what height the plane caught speeding along the Boulevard Lambermont was flying at," joked a member of the Brussels public prosecutor's office cited in the Derniere Heure report.

After the incident the police rather sheepishly said they would make sure the over enthusiastic radar was repaired.

The supersonic motorist was apparently let off with a warning.

[Copyright Expatica News 2004]

Actually, chances are less likely that the radar was that out of calibration, and more likely that the driver was using a deception jammer to produce a false result.

Screw the mini, what were the police driving to catch the guy?

well, by all acounts they should have been driving USMC (Semper Fi!) Boeing F-22 Fighters.

ceh! I thought it was for real.

well it was a real incident [img]smile.gif[/img]

Happens more than you know... the calibrations on those are prone to malfunction every so often... it happened to me a few times also. First time, clocked at 240 in a 60 zone (I was actually doing 75) and once pulled over for potentially impeding traffic at doing 30 in a 80 (I was actually doing 85-90)... kinda also makes you wonder about the *ahem* operators of those...

Minis own.