Freddie Flintoff's son says Top Gear star is 'lucky to be alive' after crash

Freddie Flintoff is lucky to be alive following a crash making Top Gear, his son has said.

The former cricketer was shooting for the BBC series at Dunsfold Park Aerodrome in Surrey yesterday morning (Tuesday 13 December) when the accident happened.

The Mirror claimed the crash took place as Flintoff was doing the show's review segment.

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Freddie's son Corey, 16, told MailOnline: "He's OK. I'm not too sure what happened but he is lucky to be alive.

"It was a pretty nasty crash. It is shocking. We are all shocked but just hope he's going to be OK."

A BBC spokesperson said following the crash: "Freddie was injured in an accident at the Top Gear test track this morning – with crew medics attending the scene immediately.

"He has been taken to hospital for further treatment and we will confirm more details in due course."

The father of four, who has presented the BBC One show since 2019, was airlifted to hospital following the incident, but is not thought to have suffered any life-threatening injuries, The Sun reported.

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Flintoff, who was appointed England cricket captain twice, first in 2006 and 2007, retired from the international stage in 2010, briefly returning to play for Lancashire four years later.

Following his successful sporting career he became a familiar face on television, joining various reality and panel shows and appearing as the face of supermarket brand Morrisons.

In 2010 he became a team captain on Sky's A League Of Their Own, hosted by James Corden, before being crowned king of the jungle in the first series of the Australian version of I'm A Celebrity…Get Me Out Of Here! in 2015.

After appearing in the BBC drama Love, Lies and Records in 2017, he went on to make his musical theatre debut in Kay Mellor's Fat Friends The Musical and hosted All Star Musicals for ITV in December the same year.

He was announced in October 2018, ahead of the show's 27th series, as a new host of Top Gear alongside Paddy McGuinness and Chris Harris.

Tuesday's accident is not the first faced by Flintoff since he began working on the programme.

In February 2019 the presenter was involved in a minor incident when he crashed into a market stall in Mansfield, Nottinghamshire.

In September of the same year he crashed again while driving a three-wheel vehicle at a reported speed of 124mph during filming for Top Gear at Elvington Airfield in Yorkshire, but walked away from the incident unharmed.

Former presenter Richard Hammond was involved in a serious crash at the same airfield in 2006, leaving him in a coma.

Topics: TV and Film, Top Gear

Jake Massey

Jake Massey is a journalist at LADbible. He graduated from Newcastle University, where he learnt a bit about media and a lot about living without heating. After spending a few years in Australia and New Zealand, Jake secured a role at an obscure radio station in Norwich, inadvertently becoming a real-life Alan Partridge in the process. From there, Jake became a reporter at the Eastern Daily Press. Jake enjoys playing football, listening to music and writing about himself in the third person.

@jakesmassey