back to article Sat nav blunder places The Rock in Skegness

In an epic, multinational sat nav cock-up, a Syrian lorry driver aiming for Gibraltar left Turkey and ended up in Skegness. Only as Necdet Bakimci inched his 32-ton car transporter down a narrow Lincolnshire lane leading to Gibraltar Point nature reserve did he twig that he might have taken a wrong turn, but by this point the …

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  1. John Robson Silver badge

    SatNav on, brain off.

    Given the amount of brain that would have to have been turned off for this to occur I have to question the safety of satnav devices.

  2. Tim
    Unhappy

    boo. The scorpion king DOESNT do summer season!

    I had high hopes for this article.

  3. Steve Evans

    How...

    ... did the driver even get into our country! Originating from outside the EU, surely he would be required to have some documents giving him clearance to be transporting all that stuff? Let alone bring himself into our country as a worker!

    I can't even order some PC components from the USA without having to make a trip to the local post office to pay tax on them... And annoyingly a handling charge with exceed even the tax... Makes me wonder what exactly the postage is supposed to pay for if it's not the handling!

  4. shay mclachlan
    Flame

    But which one has more apes?

    Skeggy obviously. Gibraltar doesnt have a Butlins.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Alert

    Do Reg Hacks...

    ... get all their news stories from The Sun?

    That's the third one today (at least).

    Why don't you just add a direct link to the home page... or is this part of a grand strategy to pimp El-Reg to Rupert?

  6. Gordon Pryra

    The guy wasnt to bothered

    Because his real undocumented cargo is now farming cockles off the coast of Skeggy

  7. JCL

    Gibralta Point eh?

    Hmm, the feller's a fool on all sorts of levels! You would think he would have a good overall idea of which countries he would need to travel through - wouldn't you? He was lucky to have seen someone down that road, it's dead at the best of times...

  8. Goat Jam
    Paris Hilton

    Uh

    Say what?

    I'm in Australia so I'm not 100% sure how far he went but surely he would have had to cross several national borders during his journey.

    It's the EU's fault. Back in ye olden days he would have been turned back at the first checkpoint I'm sure.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    It's not the fault of the satnav

    It's the bloody stupid driver. Surely he must have noticed that he was going the wrong way?

  10. Stef

    Yeah right...

    ... blame the Sat Nav.

    Why not blame the truck, after all it was the truck that took him there.

  11. Luke
    Stop

    Sun reader -

    two words that really only go together in that context.

    @Anonymous Coward

    I don't read the Sun myself, so if true, is useful to me. I like hearing about confused truck drivers ending up at the opposite end of the continent due to the failings of good old-fashioned common sense.

    I would be scared of a world where only one news source could report a single story!

  12. jim

    Wheels etc..

    He's lucky he didn't have his wheels stolen while parked up.

    Anyway what could Gib possibly want from Syria, and by the truck load?

  13. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Syrian driver?

    A Syrian (or Turkish) driver would need a UK visa to enter the UK, but his Schengen visa would let him enter Gibraltar. The number plate on the truck in the picture is not Syrian, or Turkish it's the EU blue plate. The ferry of course would have been paid for. The paperwork for importing a vehicle is a PITA and would need to have been predone. Perhaps Corral road (two r's? I can't find a Coral Road). Necdet Bakimci, well the name is Turkish.

    The detail isn't quite right.

  14. Simon
    Alert

    no really?

    That's brilliant. Security @ border crossings non existent if entering the UK disguised as a bewildered and very geographically challenged Turkish Truck driver.

  15. John Macintyre

    @Jim

    er... cars I presume..

    "...then arranged for the lorry-load of cars ..."

  16. Tawakalna
    Joke

    not Skegness for apes,

    but Hartlepool, home of monkey-hangers since the end of the 18th century.

  17. steogede
    Coat

    The Rock in Skegness

    We all know that know that Skegness is in the Rock (atleast Skegness Rock, obviously Blackpool Rock has Blackpool written in it).

    ... more serioulsy

    @jim, According to the article, cars (prestige cars according to the Sun) and the firm was Turkish not Syrian, that was the driver.

    I would also like to point out that although the haulage firm was Turkish that doesn't mean the load originated in Turkey. It is quite possible (infact, most likely) that the cars were assembled in Birmingham, collected and taken direct to Skegness without passing any national borders. Quite possibly a load of rugs (or whatever turkey exports) was delivered to Birmingham and then the cars were picked up as a return load, via Gibraltar. However that wouldn't have made such a tasty story.

  18. Anonymous Coward
    Paris Hilton

    Which is why I dispise these devices...

    ... My GF has her sat nav set in Darth Vader voice mode, so we're on holiday and end up having a big old row because she depends completely on where Darth bleedin' Vader is telling us to go.

    So now we've gone in a circle three times, which is what I've been telling her for the last 20 minutes, pointing repeatedly at a good old fashioned map.

    Nope, Darth is right always, poncy old paper map - (the ones that have served us well for the last few thousand years) - must be wrong.

    When Darth told us to head down a road with big M.O.D signs, warning of sudden gunfire and possible death, she finally relented and Darth was shoved in the cubby hole - for about 10 minutes until we got lost again...

    Satnav? - welcome to the dark side...

    Paris, because we like her Tom Toms.

  19. Anonymous Coward
    IT Angle

    Visa?

    "need a UK visa to enter the UK, but his Schengen visa would let him enter Gibraltar"

    I thought that this particular bit of Spain was considered to be part of the UK (by some people) and hence is outside the Schengen area. I wouldn't blame the Spanish border police if they make life hell for (resident) Brits crossing the border.

    Maybe we should offer Skeggy to Spain in part-exchange...

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Pirate

    Blind reliance on tech

    According to an article in The Mirror, about 300,000 drivers in the UK had accidents because of sat nav.

    http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/topstories/2008/07/21/satnav-danger-revealed-navigation-device-blamed-for-causing-300-000-crashes-89520-20656554/

  21. Les Matthew
    Boffin

    Re: Syrian driver?

    "The detail isn't quite right."

    There's a hidden clue in the included link.

  22. Anonymous Coward
    Coat

    @blind reliance

    "300,000 drivers in the UK had accidents because of sat nav"

    Maybe we should introduce cameras to detect them...

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @Gibraltar and schengen

    Yes perhaps I misunderstood their comment. It looks like Gibraltar accepts Schengen visas, however it doesn't, it *requires* multi-entry schengen visas as a condition of entry for people coming from Schengen zone (because Spain won't let them back in otherwise when they try to leave).

    So yeh, perhaps he'd need a UK visa even for Gibraltar.

  24. Jared Earle

    I call Bullshit

    I reckon it's a Sun horror story of "bleedin' furriners just wander in and take our jobs innit" disguised as a wayward driver. A subtle tale of how weak our border security is.

  25. matt

    Ferry Ticket

    Did the SatNav tell him to buy a ferry ticket as well?

    Literally beyond belief

  26. Tim
    Go

    @Matt

    Well, clearly the force was strong in that one!

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Makes things much clearer

    Parcelforce clearly use the same satnav system.

  28. pctechxp

    If you smell!

    What The Rock is cookin'

    Seriously though, it astonishes me how many cabbies round here drive completely via sat nav and heard some stories about experienced ones having airport/business meeting runs to London taken off them because they did not have a sat nav.

    Ridiculous.

  29. George Johnson

    What about the ferry/tunnel?

    Surely when it said "You next stop after the ferry/tunnel is England!" the alarm bells should have gone off?

  30. LeBeourfCurtaine
    Flame

    @Tim - Equally high hopes here

    Still, the lack of news reports outlining the destruction of Skeggy by the Scorpion King should have been a big clue :o/

  31. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    They are just a tool! Stop branding them the latest invention of the devil!

    To all the nobs who complain about sat navs being useless, they are just a tool. Just 'cos a chainsaw can be operated without protection and used to carve up bone and gristle, doesn't mean it should be used like that, for that.

    As usual the middle-England, pandering media stirring up anti-tech shite, although they will quite happily use a Mac or PC to order a load of expensive tat across the internet from commercial sites that don't even bother with SSL encryption!

  32. David Perry
    Pirate

    Stuck under bridges - thank you satnav

    A one-way bridge near my now former home had an asda guy sent under it THE WRONG WAY by satnav - his truck also had the top corner near the chiller unit mashed by said bridge (on top of it is a stretch of dual-carriageway A road). I did have a pic somewhere on my phone, think I might have deleted it tho - will post link if I find it :D

  33. Anonymous Coward
    Flame

    RE: Which is why I dispise these devices...

    Maybe you should break up - you obviously hate her.

    On a side note - your sat nav really does suck. Mine has done nothing but get me to places that I would never have found on my own (because sometimes, people don't have a second person in the car and it's unsafe to have a map open while driving). I've never been taken the wrong way, and I've never had one in a never ending loop!?

    To be honest, you are as bad as those people who all complain things were better before computers - and any problems is the computers fault, not the users or procedures. Seriously - stop reading el-reg!

  34. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    Engage Brain before programming Satnav.

    Why blame the satnav? surely the guy had a working brain....

  35. TheHempKnight

    Finally the Rock has come back to... Skegness?

    Finally the Rock has come back to... Skegness?

    thought not, but would have been a hell of a turnup for the local caravan parks or even Butlins.

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