A Parking Valet Just Crashed This Priceless Ferrari 250 California Spyder After Confusing The Brake With The Accelerator

It seems that parking valets around the globe are conspiring to make headlines. In May last year, one worker embarrasingly pranged an owner’s new Aventador in Monaco (he didn’t realise the car was in gear), and in July, another valet smashed a Gallardo Spyder into a wall in New Delhi, India.

While today’s news isn’t one of a totalled or overturned car in flames, this Ferrari valet prang is making headlines because the car in question - a 1962 Ferrari 250 California Spyder - is one of the most expensive cars to grace God’s green earth. Last year, one of these cars went under the hammer and was sold for $15.18m (£10.04m).

The reason for the crash is that the parking valet mistook the V12’s accelerator pedal for the brake pedal. The damage to the car doesn’t seem to be too extreme, but will certainly be expensive to fix. The company for whom the valet was working - Secure Parking Corporation - has accepted liability and will pay the repair bill.

Owner Neil Petch was waiting for a friend when the incident happened. When he spoke to Dubai newspaper 7 Days In Dubai , he said “The friend I was meeting called me from the parking lot (…) He said, ‘Neil, what happened to your car?’ I thought he was playing a prank. But he told me I better get down there. And then I saw it…”

Update:

There is a question mark over the 250 California Spyder’s authenticity. CT reader Rick Stafford - who races Ferraris and who grew up with a Ferrari garage in his family - has said the following in a message to us:

‘Pretty sure that Ferrari 250 California is a replica. Based on the photo of the damage, the tyres are wrong as is the indicator positioning etc, and from the damage it looks like the body is fibreglass, which wasn’t original.’

If the car turns out to be a replica, then the repair bill will likely be a mere shadow of that for an original classic. Either way, it’s very sad to see a thing of such beauty - real or not - get damaged.