Zhejiang car driver's 130km/h nightmare trip
A version of the Hollywood film took place on a highway in Zhejiang last month when a mechanical failure forced a car driver to travel at 130km/h for nearly two hours.
His ordeal ended when he crashed into a roadside barrier shortly after entering Shanghai.
The driver, from Jiaxing in Zhejiang, told the yesterday he put the car into cruise control - at 130km/h - while south of Hangzhou and heading towards Shanghai at about 5pm.
He started to panic when he found he was unable to reduce the car's speed using either the brakes or the gears.
He phoned his wife, who called the police and maintained contact to try to calm him down.
Lu Feng , a police officer at a checkpoint near Shanghai, said they ordered toll gates on the car's route to open to allow it to pass through and then ordered ambulances to follow the car.
After entering Shanghai, where the road became congested, the driver was forced to apply the handbrake, causing the car to swerve and hit a road barrier several times before coming to a halt at about 6.45pm.
The driver was not injured but said he was still traumatised by the incident on November 19 and had developed a fear of cars.
In the 1994 film, a Los Angeles cop played by Keanu Reeves has to keep a bus moving at above 80km/h to stop it from exploding.
