Paris - It sounds like a scene from a video game or the Keanu Reeves movie Speed.
A motorist in France claims that his car's cruise control got stuck at 190 kilometres per hour while he was driving on Sunday, forcing police to help clear a route for his crazy ride along a busy highway.
The daily Le Parisien quoted Hicham Dequiedt saying he was overtaking a truck when his Renault Vel Satis started to accelerate with a life of its own.
He couldn't cut the ignition, he said, because that make of car has a magnetic card instead of a key.
'It was impossible to slow down' "It was impossible to slow down! Stomping on the brakes proved pointless, nothing worked," the 29-year-old was quoted as saying.
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"I avoided one car after another by flashing my lights at them."
Dequiedt managed to alert police on his cellphone. Messages warning other motorists of the danger were flashed up on screens that straddle the highway and over a traffic radio station.
As he was bearing down on a toll booth, Dequiedt said he finally managed to bring the car to a halt - having raced down 200 kilometres of highway between Vierzon and Riom in central France.
"I stomped on the brakes as hard as I could and the car finally stopped," he sai.
Renault's press office said on Tuesday that no representatives were immediately available to answer questions.
But a sceptical-sounding Louis Schweitzer, boss of the French auto giant, told Le Parisien: "As it is described, this incident surprises me and seems very improbable." - Sapa-AP
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