Daredevil Hammond defies death

FORMER Top Gear star Richard Hammond, pictured, cheated death on Saturday after a dramatic high-speed car crash in Switzerland.

Footage captured the moment the TV presenter’s £2 million (R33m) electric supercar swerved off a road before bursting into flames during filming for his TV show The Grand Tour 2.

Incredibly, Hammond, 47, was able to pull himself from the wreckage before the car caught fire. He was airlifted to hospital with a fractured knee.

It is the second time Hammond has escaped from a terrifying crash.

He was in a coma for two weeks in September 2006 after the jet-powered Vampire car he was driving for Top

Gear at 464km/h suffered a burst tyre during a landspeed record attempt.

Of Saturday’s accident, co-presenter Jeremy Clarkson tweeted: “It was the biggest crash I’ve ever seen and the most frightening, but incredibly, and thankfully, Richard seems to be mostly OK.”

Last month, after being knocked out in a motorbike accident while filming in Africa, the star swore never to take part in any more dangerous stunts for the sake of his “beautiful” family.

The father-of-two was driving the white Rimac supercar around the Hemberg Hill Climb in the village of St Gallen in northern Switzerland for his Amazon Prime show when the horrifying accident happened.

Photographs showed the car by the side of a road before the blaze was put out by firefighters, leaving a burnt-out hulk. Race trials were being held on a closed section of mountain road ahead of the race yesterday.

After last month’s accident, Hammond vowed never to put his life on the line again, saying: “I’ve a beautiful wife and two beautiful daughters. I’m not going to risk leaving them. Not for their sake, but for mine.” – Mail On Sunday