Bentley in Border Bridge Crash was a luxury car packed with power
The car that exploded this week at a border bridge in Niagara Falls, New York, was a 2022 Bentley Flying Spur, authorities said Friday, an ultra-luxury model that could reach 60 miles per hour in four seconds.
Police identified Kurt P. Villani as the driver and his wife, Monica Villani, as the passenger. The couple, both 53 years old and from Grand Island, owned several businesses in western New York and were on their way to a concert in Toronto before the fatal crash, which remained unexplained.
The base model Flying Spur was powered by an eight-cylinder engine that generated 542 horsepower and weighed 5,137 pounds. Specifications from Edmunds, which provides consumer car data. Used models cost over $200,000, and Car and Driver magazine said that “the Flying Spur’s unbeatable blend of luxury and performance comes with an eye-watering six-figure price tag.”
There has been speculation online about the make and model of the car since the incident occurred shortly before noon on Wednesday, with investigators looking into whether a mechanical problem had caused the car to spin out of control. Video showed the vehicle driving at a shocking speed toward the bridge before hitting a median and fleeing the scene. On impact it burst into flames and shattered, scattering metal across a large field of rubble.
Erin Bronner, a spokeswoman for the U.S. arm of Bentley Motors, said Friday she could not release any information about the Villanis’ car.
Ms Bronner said the incident was not related to a 2021 recall of some models due to the risk of their accelerator pedals getting stuck. She said this problem did not exist on left-hand drive cars, the kind sold in the United States and Canada.
Niagara Falls police took over the investigation after the Federal Bureau of Investigation concluded Wednesday that the crash was not related to terrorism, despite initial fears and a sweeping response from local, state and federal authorities, including the closure of several border crossings.
Robert Restaino, the mayor of Niagara Falls, said investigators believed the couple was originally headed to a Kiss concert, which was called off about three and a half hours before the show due to a band member’s illness.
The police crash reconstruction team tracked the couple’s journey from a downtown casino to the border crossing, examining surveillance footage, the crash scene and other evidence collected by federal authorities.
After the Villanis left the Seneca Niagara Resort & Casino, just east of the city’s famous waterfalls, they struck a median and crashed into a border control booth, sending the Flying Spur airborne. The explosion, initially feared to be a terrorist attack, sent government and law enforcement officials scrambling to determine what had happened. A worker at the checkpoint was slightly injured.
The Villanis were well known on Grand Island, a generally prosperous island city with approximately 21,500 inhabitants that’s just north of Buffalo and halfway to Niagara, where residents were shocked, said Nate McMurray, the former city supervisor who still has a home there. a family businesstheir Ace Hardware store, Gui’s woodhas several locations in Western New York and Grand Island.
“It’s not like a Home Depot,” Mr. McMurray said. “It’s more of a community place.”
Attempts to reach the victims’ families by telephone and in person were unsuccessful.
Mr. McMurray said he had received dozens of messages from shocked Grand Islanders since the crash. “People say, ‘Oh my God, what happened?’” Mr. McMurray said.
Law enforcement and forensic experts asked the same question after the violent crash and explosion, which left little of the car except a burn scar.
Paul Lane contributed reporting from Grand Island, NY