A South African removal driver had a miraculous escape after the brakes of his pick-up truck failed, sending it plunging over a cliff. Dramatic CCTV footage shows Courage Ncube, 34, heading down a steep road in his loaded Toyota with two colleagues standing in the back when suddenly he could not stop.
The Harrowing Incident
The brake pedal in his truck slammed straight down to the floor as the Toyota suddenly sped forward at a terrifying rate towards a tight 45-degree right-hand bend. Both men on the back screamed and leapt off, but as the dramatic security footage shows, Courage had no choice but to hang onto the steering wheel.
The Toyota slammed into a solid stone wall at 50mph after it accelerated out of control for 30 metres downhill, bursting through dozens of cemented rock boulders. The rollercoaster ride continued as Courage stared down through the windscreen at the fast-approaching tarmac while the truck pile-drived bonnet first into it.
The freefalling truck somersaulted onto its roof before the force of the impact flipped it another 180 degrees, landing back upright on its wheels. But the most remarkable moment came seconds later: the driver's side door swung open almost immediately, and Courage stepped out to survey the debris surrounding his written-off pick-up without a single scratch.
Aftermath and Reactions
Miraculously, he survived without so much as a broken bone or a bleeding wound. Instead, he was left wondering how he would explain to his client where his belongings were. Also incredibly lucky was the driver of a Toyota Corolla, which is seen passing straight beneath where the pick-up crash-landed just four seconds earlier. If it had landed on top of it, those inside would likely have been killed.
The CCTV footage has gone viral following the accident on Sunday at 6.30pm at the tiny hamlet of Misty Cliffs on the Cape Peninsula, 25 miles south of Cape Town. Badly shaken, Courage said: 'I was doing my job to help my boss move a man from his old house to his new house, and the road down from it was very steep indeed. It is a very dangerous mountain, and then I just lost my brakes and I just went down fast and I fell over the mountain side to the tarmac, but thanks to God I am alive. I am a hard-working man, and that pick-up truck was my only way to earn a living. It is now for the scrap yard, but it is my blessing that I still have my life.'
Community Support
Misty Cliffs Village Association treasurer Jon Kerr said that the residents all felt very sorry for Courage and had agreed to set up a BackaBuddy fund to replace his old truck. Retired Jon, 66, said: 'From the video you can see that Courage had a very lucky escape, and it is a miracle he was not very seriously hurt or even worse, but somehow he survived it. If we can help him get another pick-up truck and get him back out on the road and working, then that would be wonderful, and we hope that others out there will chip in. Nobody has been talking about anything else in Misty Cliffs since it happened.'
The huge gap left in the rock boulder wall on the sharp bend at the bottom of Old Camp Road down to the Main Road has been filled with sand bags pending a full repair. A South African Police spokesman said: 'It was no more than an accident, so there is no action to be taken, but it was very lucky that neither the driver nor anyone else was killed. The Cape Peninsula is very mountainous, and it is important that everyone driving along it has good brakes.'
