Traffic authorities in Zamora, near Spain’s northwest border with Portugal, stated on Tuesday that all signs pointed to Jota being behind the wheel and possibly exceeding the 120 km/h (74 mph) speed limit when the vehicle suffered a suspected tyre blowout.
On Wednesday, Portuguese truck driver José Azevedo, who claims to have filmed the burning Lamborghini on the A-52 near Cernadilla, insisted the car passed him “very calmly” and “without speeding.” ..Continue Reading
Azevedo also shared in a video that he attempted to extinguish the flames with a fire extinguisher but was unable to save Jota or his brother André Silva, who both died in the crash.
Another truck driver, identified locally as José Aleixo Duarte, told Correio da Manhã that Jota’s car overtook him roughly five minutes before the accident and was traveling at what he described as a “moderate speed.”
He also criticized the condition of the road where the fatal crash occurred, saying it’s in a “bad state.”
Azevedo was the first to publicly identify himself as the person who filmed the viral footage of Jota’s car engulfed in flames.
He said in a selfie video shot from his lorry cab justifying his decision to speak out “There’s a video on the Internet, on TV, of Diogo Jota’s car on fire at night.
“Supposedly it was a lorry driver who filmed it and didn’t provide first aid. Well, that lorry driver was me. I filmed it and I have proof of it.”
During the four-minute video he turned his mobile phone towards his name on the lorry tachograph, which matched the name on the HGV dashboard tachograph in the night-time footage of Jota’s burning car.
Both sets of footage also show a slightly cracked windscreen which Mr Azevedo offered up as proof he was telling the truth about seeing the crash. He said: “I stopped, grabbed the fire extinguisher and tried to help.
“Because of the impact of the accident – forget it! – there was nothing I could do. Nothing, absolutely nothing! As for the family, my condolences, my sincere feelings. I have a clear conscience, I know what I saw. They passed me super calmly, without speeding, without speeding.”
Making no mention of going to the police after witnessing the crash, Mr Azevedo said: “ I didn’t even know who was in the Lamborghini that day. I only found out the next day because, when I arrived at my destination, I shared the video with my wife, and in the morning I learnt that it was the brothers in the car.
“You have my word that they weren’t speeding. They were going super-calmly. I drive this road every day, from Monday to Saturday, and I know what it’s like: it’s not worth s***. It’s a dark road and I could see the make of the car, the colour of the car, everything.
“I filmed it, I stopped, I tried to help, but unfortunately there was nothing I could do. My conscience is clear.” He conceded he had “thought twice” about going public but said he had been spurred into doing so by ‘Internet haters’ who were saying he had done nothing to assist Diogo or his brother and had only posted footage of their burning Lamborghini for “likes.”
He spoke out just hours after Spanish newspaper El Mundo claimed Spanish police were trying to identify or locate crash eye-witnesses including the person behind the viral video of the footballers’ Lamborghini.
In only their second official statement since last week’s crash, the Civil Guard said on Tuesday: “The expert report is still being worked on and finalised. Among other things traffic police from the Zamora branch of the Civil Guard are studying the tread marked by one of the wheels of the vehicle.
“Everything is also pointing to a possible high excess of speed over the permitted speed on that stretch of the motorway.
“All the tests carried out for the moment point to the driver of the crash vehicle being Diogo Jota. The expert police report when it is finalised will be handed over to a court in Puebla de Sanabria.”
The force said the same day of the 12.30am crash “Everything is pointing to a tyre blowout as the car was overtaking. As a result of the accident, the car caught fire and both occupants died.”
Spanish road safety expert Javier Lopez Delgado has pointed the finger at “multiple factors” which include the driving speed, saying: “If they had been going at 55mph they probably wouldn’t have been killed. It seems very clear they were going very fast because of the skid marks.”
Mr Lopez Delgado, president of the Spanish Association of Road Safety Auditors (ASEVI), said he believed the road surface had been a contributing factor to the deaths, insisting: “You can clearly see it had many faults.”
In comments to local paper La Opinion de Zamora this week, the expert engineer said a tyre blowout he linked to the tyre not being in the “right conditions or having the correct pressure”, wouldn’t be the only factor that caused the crash.
