- Prince Harry and Meghan Markle stated they have been concerned in a “near-catastrophic” automobile chase with paparazzi.
- A photographer who chased them blamed their driver for making the chase a “catastrophic expertise.”
- The photographer instructed Good Morning Britain it was “very tense” making an attempt to maintain up with the automobiles.
A photographer concerned in Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s “near-catastrophic” automobile chase on Tuesday blamed their driver for inflicting the chaos.
In an interview with Good Morning Britain on Thursday, the photographer — saved nameless and filmed along with his again towards the digicam — stated that he adopted the couple in his automobile after they left the Ziegfeld Ballroom on West 54th Avenue in New York Metropolis.
“Final night time, after leaving the theatre, there have been hopes from me and some different photographers that possibly they might go to a restaurant,” he instructed the British morning present. “For essentially the most half, I used to be driving and it was very tense making an attempt to maintain up with the automobiles.”
The photographer claimed that the couple’s driver “did numerous blocking” and tried completely different maneuvers “to cease what was occurring.”
“Their driver was making it a catastrophic expertise,” he added. “In the event that they have been going 80 mph, I’d in all probability be going 20 mph behind them and hoping to maintain sight of them. So if it was harmful and catastrophic it greater than possible was based mostly on the person who was driving, versus anybody else.”
—Good Morning Britain (@GMB) May 18, 2023
Earlier than the chase, the Sussexes had attended the Ms. Basis Girls of Imaginative and prescient Awards ceremony in Manhattan, the place Meghan gave a speech.
On their method house, at round 10 p.m., a “ring of highly-aggressive paparazzi” chased them for “over two hours,” their spokesperson stated in a statement tweeted by Yahoo! News UK’s executive royals editor Omid Scobie.
The “near-catastrophic” chase resulted in “a number of close to collisions involving different drivers on the highway, pedestrians, and two NYPD officers,” they added.
Legislation-enforcement sources instructed NBC Information that photographers adopted the couple for 75 minutes up and down the Franklin D. Roosevelt East River Drive, which runs alongside the east facet of Manhattan.
Julian Phillips, an NYPD spokesman beforehand instructed Insider in a press release that police “assisted the non-public safety crew” in defending the couple.
“There have been quite a few photographers that made their transport difficult,” Phillips stated. “The Duke and Duchess of Sussex arrived at their vacation spot and there have been no reported collisions, summonses, accidents, or arrests in regard.”
Paul Burrell, a former butler to Princess Diana, described the incident as a “superstar storm in a teacup” in one other interview with Good Morning Britain on Thursday.
“I’m discovering it tough to compute all of the completely different statements that are coming from the Sussex camp,” he added.
A full timeline of how the chase unfolded could be discovered right here. Representatives for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex didn’t instantly reply to Insider’s request for remark.