Garage Valet Totals Ferrari 599 GTO In Rome, Confused The Pedals
Warning, more sensitive lovers of luxury Italian cars will not like this piece of news. A garage valet has smashed a Ferrari 599 GTO, worth around $445,000, into a store front in Rome, Italy, totally writing it off.
Roberto Cinto, 38, was hospitalized after the accident, but apparently this was more for shock, than physical injury. And who wouldn’t be shocked after totaling such a precious vehicle?
Readers may know that sinking feeling when they hear a crunch while trying to park in a difficult spot. Imagine that feeling times about one thousand and you will know how Cinto felt when he wrote off the Ferrari 599 GTO.
Italian parking: £300,000 Ferrari destroyed by attendant http://t.co/hYkxoEkOW4 pic.twitter.com/ooZdL4M1Oq
— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) April 1, 2015
According to the NL Times, the incident happened on Monday morning, when the valet was returning the Ferrari 599 GTO to its now rather unhappy Dutch owners, who were staying at the Hotel Exedra in the center of Rome.
While the hotel was only a very short distance from the garage, he managed to smash the car into a local store front, almost completely destroying that as well.
Having a bad day? Spare a thought for the valet who crashed a £300,000 Ferrari http://t.co/71suwZrNCS pic.twitter.com/056zyaWBUb
— Daily Mirror (@DailyMirror) April 2, 2015
Cinto told the police that he got confused.
“I got confused – instead of the brake, I pressed down on the accelerator.”
He made such a mess of the car (as can be seen from the video above) that one witness to the accident said it looked like a bomb had gone off.
The particular Ferrari 599 GTO that Cinto wrote off is pretty powerful. The car has a 670bhp V12 engine and apparently weighs only 1,495kg.
Apparently it was valet parking gone wrong. Pity about the Ferrari. @speedmonkeycouk: pic.twitter.com/NBT7ckCrWg”
— Ineke Ligthart (@LigthartIneke12) March 31, 2015
If you imagine that the Ferrari 599 GTO can go up to 208mph and will get 0-60mph in 3.4 seconds, you get an idea of the problem when confusing those darn pedals.
According to the Mirror Online, photos of the hapless Ferrari 599 GTO have since gone viral on the social media and according to the Italian media, the insurance company is “probing the incident.”
It seems some Twitter members are rather cruelly calling the incident, “valet parking Italian style.”
“Valet parking – Italian style”. Italian parking: £300,000 Ferrari destroyed by attendant http://t.co/On4y3PfQFK
— syedasad (@dsyedasad) April 1, 2015
Whether the hapless garage driver will keep his job is unknown, but he will no doubt suffer the guilt of destroying that Ferrari 599 GTO in his own mind for a very long time.
The photo below will give you an idea what the car looked like before the crash.
[Image: Ferrari 599 GTO Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Axion23]
