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This will be a narrative. There is no other way of telling it. If you don't feel like reading, just scroll down for the pictures.
Here is my story.
I had this exciting long drive from Lithuania to Barcelona, Spain (~2k miles), and in the middle of the trip something unexpected happened.
It was a night. I was driving on a highway in Italy. I was in the second lane when a truck driving ahead of me in the 1st lane suddenly turns to my lane right in front of me. I hit hard on a break (ABS jumps in), and poof I can hear a noise of glass smashing, and my lights go dark, a yellow "lights dimmed" error appears. For the moment I thought I rear ended the truck. The truck drives away without stopping, and I drive slowly to the side of the highway. I stop the car and in my mind I can see the front smashed. I come out of the car and slowly approach the front of it, and to my surprise the front is fine except for the front headlight is missing on the driver side. I can see millions of glass pieces on the tarmac reflecting lights of the cars passing by on the highway. It was my headlight which fell of the car when breaking hard.
I quickly realized what happened. 20 minutes ago we had stopped for a quick pizza in a small town called Voghera (southern Italy). We were two cars, 991 Carrera S and 458 italia. Some people reactions to the cars was like they saw aliens to land. Guys were shouting and pointing fingers at us. We parked our cars on the street and went three blocks down for a take away pizza. While walking we could see guys coming to the out some bar one after another, it seemed they talked about us.
We were having our pizzas sitting on the bench outside the restaurant, when four midaged gypsies approached us and started talking to us broken English. One of them was on the phone. My buddy could understand some words they were talking. He thought they were talking about us. It took us five minutes to swallow the pizzas and we started heading back. When we came back, the cars were standing fine.
To summarize, it appears that those gypsies were watching out for the thieves working on 911 and reporting about what we were doing. It seems they did not have time to finish the job and they left the headlight loose.
BTW, there was not a single police station that would take a report from us at 9 PM local time. We checked two cities on our way. I had to drive to Monaco for the night and go back to Italy the next day to fill a report.
Here are some pictures of how we fixed the hole in order to be able to continue driving. It was not possible to drive fast without covering the hole because the air drag would make the car unstable.
To strenghten the headlight bay against the air drang we stuffed it with a rubber soccer ball for kids, one blanket, gift wrapping paper and two pie pans on top, and fixed everything with painters tape.
You made out better than my friends Dad who stopped his box truck at a restaurant in Mexico, only to have some thieves try to steal the gas tank off the side. They only loosened it, it fell under the truck at speed and exploded. He wound up clinging to life for three months in a Mexican hospital. Thieves suck.
I have been to Voghera several times because my company has a plant there. About two years ago, my friend and I went to Milan on a Saturday via train. On the way back in the subway station he got his pocket picked. The police could care less. Things are getting really bad in this part of Europe -- just look what happened in France.
Hope you get your car restored back to a new state soon.
This will be a narrative. There is no other way of telling it...To summarize, it
appears that those gypsies were watching out for the thieves working on 911
and reporting about what we were doing. It seems they did not have time to
finish the job and they left the headlight loose.
That is one of the weirdest Porsche stories I have ever heard!
Did you get the headlight replaced in Spain? Hope you have a safe
return trip back to Lithuania!
I hear you re: hashtag #welcometosouthernitaly. But the problem
is not limited to Southern Italy. My wife & I almost had our brand new
MY1995 BMW M3 stolen in Bergamo (Northern Italy) during one of
our past European Delivery vacations. Fortunately, the would-be-thieves
could not get it 'hot-wired' during our lunch stop due to the new 'chip'
imbedded on ignition keys that year by BMW. The Italian Police was
useless. They could have cared less. We took it to the local BMW
dealership and they overnighted parts from Germany. And we left
there after a two day delay!
I will never again bring an expensive automobile purchased via ED
to Italy...and most European Delivery programs today caution or
prohibit you re: taking the vehicle into Italy because of the rather
significant theft incidents that have been reported & the losses
suffered by their insurance carriers!
But Romani targeting Porsches at lunch stops...that is rather novel!
Saludos,
Eduardo
Carmel
PS Title should read 'tried to steal' rather than 'stole'...because they
didn't managed to complete the felonious deed, although the results
were indeed the same!
11-16-2015, 08:47 PM
How gypsies stole my headlight (photos)
