BRITISH TEAM FORCED TO POSTPONE WORLD ELECTRIC LAND SPEED RECORD ATTEMPT

Unfriendly geography forces delay

The Primetime land Speed Record team, in their car ABB e=motion, have been forced to postpone their World Electric Land Speed record Attempt. In a climatic freak, which happens once in fifteen years, the surface of the Chott-El-Jerid salt flats has become unstable and therefore unsuitable for driving at high speeds.

Driver Mark Newby comments: "We had a track mapped out for the attempt which was shorter than we would have liked anyway. Overnight, the rising of the water table beneath the salt flats meant that large areas - which had previously been usable - became marshy. The car needs a dry, flat surface on which to run and this was no longer available to us."

The team are obviously disappointed. Many man-years of engineering effort and expertise have led up to the Tunisia expedition, the culmination of a four-year project. Mark Newby says: "The problem is not the car or the engineering, which was all superb. We’ve just been temporarily frustrated by the weather. The car itself is ready to go and as soon as we can find 11km of continuous flat land we’re ready to go."