Richard Hammond crashed a $1 million Rimac Concept_One all-electric supercar

While filming the second season of the Amazon Prime’s The Grand Tour in Switzerland earlier today, ex-Top Gear host Richard Hammond crashed a $1 million Rimac Concept_One all-electric supercar.

Fortunately, Hammond reportedly “suffered no serious injury”, but the rare vehicle was completely destroyed. 

The show issued a statement about the accident:

“Richard Hammond was involved in a serious crash after completing the Hemburg Hill Climb in Switzerland in a Rimac Concept One, an electric supercar built in Croatia, during filming for the Grand Tour Season 2 on Amazon Prime, but very fortunately suffered no serious injury. Richard was conscious and talking, and climbed out of the car himself before the vehicle burst into flames. He was flown by Air Ambulance to the hospital in St Gallen to be checked over revealing a fracture to his knee. Nobody else was in the car or involved in the accident, and we’d like to thank the paramedics on site for their swift response. The cause of the crash is unknown and is being investigated.”

Hammond managed to get out right before the vehicle was completely destroyed by the fire:

It just made an already rare vehicle even rarer. Earlier this year, we were told by Rimac that they only plan to make 8 new units of the updated version of the Concept One, which appears to be the version that Hammond was driving for the show.

The vehicle was already a beast, but the upgrade with a new 90 kWh battery pack gave it a power increase by 100 kW to a total of 900 kW / 1224 hp which enables the Concept_One to reach 100 km/h in 2,5 seconds and 60 miles per hour in 2,4 seconds. 200 km/h are reached in 6 seconds while the 300 km/h mark falls after just 14 seconds.

After years as a popular car journalist, Hammond is used to driving powerful cars, but electric supercars can be something else with instant torque and regenerative braking.

An amateur video caught the last few seconds just before the crash down a hill:

It’s just my opinion, but it looks like maybe he got a little too confident in the Concept_One’s torque vectoring and regen braking going into that turn – so he had to apply the brakes for it.

Jeremy Clarkson, who witnessed the accident, described it as “the biggest and most frightening” accident he has seen:

It was the biggest crash I've ever seen and the most frightening but incredibly, and thankfully, Richard seems to be mostly OK.

— Jeremy Clarkson (@JeremyClarkson) June 10, 2017

While it was probably a terrifying few seconds and a costly crash, it will likely make for a good episode of the Grand Tour.