3.9.2003
Fake ambulance dash help Daewoo adventurers out of Bangladesh

Daewoo Challenge adventurers Richard Meredith and Phil McNerney are safe in Thailand on their marathon drive from London to Korea - but only after a hair-raising "escape" by ambulance in Bangladesh.

Daewoo Challenge adventurers Richard Meredith and Phil McNerney are safe in Thailand on their marathon drive from London to Korea - but only after a hair-raising "escape" by ambulance in Bangladesh.

The Brits had been forced to air-lift themselves and their Daewoo Kalos out of the capital, Dhaka, but rioters protesting at a political assassination earlier in the week threatened their way to the airport.

Their hosts, the SOS Children's Villages welfare organization, provided the answer.

They hired a private ambulance, and with sirens blaring and the two adventurers feigning injury in the back, the emergency vehicle roared its way through the angry crowds to get them to the airport and a safe onward journey to Bangkok.

It capped a remarkable 24 hours for Meredith and McNerney, who left London in June on a challenging fund-raising journey to South Korea.

With support from GM Daewoo, who also provided the car, the pair were forced to organize an air-lift over Myanmar after the military government there refused to let them drive through from Bangladesh to Thailand.

They had been marooned in Dhaka for two weeks when the volatile political situation following Monday's assignation of the Opposition leader forced an urgent assessment of the situation.

Thanks to Hellmans, the international freight forwarders, their 1.4-litre car was whisked out of Dhaka in a special cargo run by a Russian-made Antimov aircraft under a company registered in Cambodia.

Then, last Thursday (August 28), with the car safe in Bangkok, the Brits made their dramatic ambulance "escape" to join it in the Thai capital.

Speaking from a hotel there, Meredith said: "We can hardly believe what we've been through in the last 24 hours - it was more like something from a James Bond movie.

I expect someone will wake me up in a minute and tell me I've been dreaming - but it's all absolutely true." He added: "What also needs to be said is this was an effort of amazing co-operation between GM Daewoo, SOS Children's Villages, the Bangladeshi authorities and Hellmans in both Dhaka and Bangkok. "Without all of them playing a full part it would certainly have brought a premature end to our journey."

McNerney, a 26-year-old IT graduate from St Helens, Merseyside, and Meredith, 54, an author, set out from London on June 9. They have so far driven more than 15,000km through 22 countries in Europe, the former Soviet Union and now Asia.

When they arrive in Seoul they will trigger a £35,000 donation to SOS Children's Villages from GM Daewoo.