Belgian Cops Catch a Supersonic Opel Astra (Well, Sort Of)

Move over Koenigsegg Agera RS, there’s a new king of speed in town — the Opel Astra.

Well, maybe not. But a police department in Quiévrain, Belgium issued the hatchback a citation for 696km/h (432mph). To put that into perspective that’s 148mph faster than the top speed run of the Agera back in November. It’s also quicker than all the vehicles running at last year’s Speed Week on the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Unfortunately, there isn’t a super-fast Astra prowling the streets of Belgium. Instead, the ludicrous speed is the result of a computer glitch.

It’s a shame really. We hoped that the Nissan Qashqai had finally met its match. But alas this isn’t the case.

However, imagine the surprise of the driver when he opened up his mail. He probably groaned when he saw the envelope and figured he missed a speed camera somewhere. Only when he opened it did he see the insane speed staring back at him.

Afterwards, he did the only thing he could do: laugh about it on social media.

It’s rather funny the police department didn’t catch this mistake. Of course, the police may or may not know the actual top speed of the Astra (it’s 125mph if you’re wondering). However, something so ridiculously quick was bound to raise some eyebrows.

Apparently, the police department relies on computers to generate the tickets. We suppose even the best technology has off days.

The driver did contact the police department after getting the ticket. However, it still seems he ended up on the hook for speeding. But after the review of the film, the ticket dropped to 60km/h in a 50 zone.

Still a bit of a bummer for the driver, but we assume it carries a significantly lower fine.

As for hitting 432mph on the street? Well if the team behind the Bloodhound SSC ever get cheeky enough, maybe it can achieve it.

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