A HGV driver has captured the shocking moment a taxi driver pulls in front of him and brakes to come to a complete stop – in the middle of the motorway.
Florentin Barsan was returning home to Belgium last Monday after his long-haul journey to deliver goods in the United Kingdom.
The 23-year-old was heading back with a 20 tonne empty lorry, and believes that is the only reason a serious accident was avoided.
Video shows Florentin cruising down the left lane of the M23 towards the Eurotunnel from the perspective of a dashcam mounted inside his HGV.
Suddenly a black Volkswagen Sharan appears from the vehicle’s right-hand side, veering in front of Florentin at over 55mph.
The driver then sharply applies the brakes for seemingly no reason, causing Florentin to slam on his brakes as well.
The Belgian’s quick thinking sees him go from 54mph to stationary in the middle of a bustling motorway in a matter of seconds.
Bizzarely, the driver of the Volkswagen stops and waits for nearly five seconds before taking off again and continuing its journey apparently blissfully unphased by the near-accident.
Speaking today, Florentin said: “It was a normal day for me before the incident as I had just left the drop point.
“I went on the motorway to head towards the Eurotunnel and honestly I don’t know what the driver was thinking.
“I got surprised when he started braking in front of me and he started braking really hard.
“My HGV weighs 20,000kg when empty which is lucky because it is the only way I could stop so quickly and not ram him.
“You can see in the video that he didn’t have any issues or any reason to stop, he just wanted to make me crash into him.
“Luckily nobody was close behind me as that could have been fatal and taken some lives if someone had rear-ended me.
“I have to say that I was shocked and after the incident my blood pressure was higher than the clouds.
“He was driving a company car and I have sent them the evidence.
“I hope people know that we cannot brake like cars, I was just so lucky that nobody was hurt.”
A spokesperson for the offending taxi company Addison Lee said in response to the video: “Thank you for taking the time to raise this to us, I am very sorry to see this happen.
“We have been made aware of this incident, and I would like to assure you our driver management teams are dealing with this now.”
Surrey Police has been contacted for comment.
