Talk about speeding in style!

A Swedish motorist bought a new Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG in Germany – a snip at a mere $220,000 or so.

He decided to drive it home via Switzerland . . . at a hell of a speed! The Daily Mail reports:

A speeding Swedish driver is facing the world‘s biggest ever motoring fine of 650,000 euros – around £538,000 [about US $837,200] – after being clocked at 180 mph while driving through Switzerland.

. . .

Benoît Dumas, a police officer in the area where the SLS six-litre-engine car was impounded, said: ‘He needed over half-a-kilometre of road to come to a halt.’

The driver had previously escaped being clocked by numerous speed cameras on his journey simply because he was going too fast and the instruments were incapable of clocking any speed beyond 200 kph [about 137 mph].

It was a new generation of radar machines that finally caught him zooming along at close to 300 kph [about 186 mph].

‘I think the speedo on the car, which is new, is faulty,’ the driver told police.

He is unlikely to go to prison but is expected to be hit with the landmark fine because of the way speeding fines are adminitsered in Switzerland.

When his case is judged by a magistrate the fine will be based on his income and the ‘extraordinary speed’ at which he was travelling.

He is threatened with the highest possible penalty of 300 days of fines at 3,600 Swiss francs a day which comes out to close to 650,000 euros.

In Switzerland and Germany it is common for fines to be levied in such a way. In Switzerland the level of the fine is always dependant on a person‘s income – and clearly the suspect in this speeding affair is very rich indeed.

There’s more at the link.

*Sigh*

It must be nice to be so wealthy that one doesn’t have to worry about paying that sort of speeding fine . . . but I’m damned if I’d like to have that attitude towards my fellow road users. I’ve driven on European roads, where the ‘lords of the autobahn‘ roar past at mind-boggling speeds in their high-powered (and high-priced) cars, kicking up a hell of a fuss if you don’t get out of the way (even if you’re in the right, according to the rules of the road), and generally behaving as if they own the road. It doesn’t displease me to see one such driver get his rather expensive come-uppance.

The car itself, though . . . I must admit, this one makes my mouth water! Here’s a video clip from 2009, describing it.

Peter