Rowan Atkinson taken to hospital after McLaren F1 crash

Rowan Atkinson escapes with a broken shoulder as 240mph supercar smashes into tree and bursts into flames

Serious repair: The supercar, pictured being taken from the crash site, has suffered considerable damage to the rear carbon fibre bodywork

Rowan Atkinson was rushed to hospital after the car he was driving hit a lamppost and tree before catching fire on Thursday night.

The comedy actor, 56, who was once a guest star on TV programme Top Gear, was driving a McLaren F1 sports car down a country road when he crashed near Peterborough.

‘Crews attended the scene and brought the fire under control and made the vehicle safe by 8.13pm,’ a spokesperson for Cambridgeshire Fire And Rescue Service tells Metro.

‘There was one male casualty but he was not trapped.’

The Blackadder star was reportedly taken to Peterborough City Hospital but was not seriously hurt.

The East of England Ambulance Service confirmed a man had been treated for ‘a minor shoulder injury’.

The accident comes a month after the renowned ‘petrol head’ set the fastest time on a lap of the Top Gear track during the BBC
motoring show’s ‘star in a reasonably priced car’ segment.

The incident on the A605 at Haddon in Cambridgeshire is the second time the comedian has crashed the F1, which he bought in 1997 following the success of his Mr Bean film.

In 1999 he ploughed the vehicle into the back of a Rover Metro in Lancashire, but the damage this time is likely to be rather
more substantial. Pictures of the car taken before it was loaded on to a recovery truck show the sports car – the fastest road car in production when it was launched in 1992 – suffered extensive rear damage to its carbon fibre
bodywork.

Atkinson’s agent Peter Bennett-Jones said his client had been driving to his Northamptonshire home after editing his latest
film Johnny English Reborn, a sequel to the 2003 movie Johnny English, about a clumsy English spy which parodies the James Bond genre.

Mr Bennett-Jones said: ‘He is shaken but not stirred.

‘I think he was in pain and had some painkillers and stayed in hospital because obviously he didn’t have a car to get home. It is nothing more serious than that. He will be very rattled by the whole thing and I think he’ll want to keep as low profile as possible.’