MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

BBC airs advance of Top Gear Patagonia program to be shown December 27/28

Jeremy Clarkson has said that the attack on himself and the Top Gear crew in Argentina was the scariest experience of his life.

The controversial two-part episode of BBC's Top Gear filmed in Argentina will be shown on Saturday, December 27 and Sunday, December 28 on BBC Two at 8pm on both days. A few seconds advance of the show was aired this week in anticipation of the major launching.

Filming of the special episodes was interrupted when the crew had to leave Argentina because a Porsche with the number plate H982 FKL was thought to refer to the 1982 Falklands conflict - a claim rejected by Mr. Jeremy Clarkson, head of Top Gear and the BBC.

In the episodes, Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May drive the Porsche 928, Lotus Esprit and a Ford Mustang on a a 1600-mile trek through Patagonia to stage a game of car football against Argentina.

According to the Top Gear website: “There will be swamps, deserts, forests, beaches, and ski slopes for the three V8 sports cars to suffer.

”There will also be broken bones, mechanical calamities and even some cows. Plus, a climax that wasn’t really on the cards.“

The three presenters have been in Stow filming scenes for next year's series of the hit motoring show.

The controversial Jeremy Clarkson, who has had problems in several places where he filmed, described the Argentine experience as ”the most terrifying thing I've ever been involved in“.

Top Gear's trip to Argentina made headline news when the crew were forced to flee the country after mobs allegedly attacked triggered by the controversial Porsche plate number. Claims that this was a deliberate ”stunt“ have been repeatedly denied by Top Gear producers and presenters who say the plate was a pure coincidence.

The controversial number plate does not appear on the promo, although a reference to the baying mob faced by the team in Argentina appears referenced when the team look through binoculars and ask: ”Who the hell are these guys?“

Apparently by this stage the plate had ”fallen off“, and the convoy had other plates. The program is based the two-and-a-half weeks of filming had happened before the incidents.

The whole experience motivated strong protest letters from Argentine ambassador in London, Alicia Castro, who argued that Mr. Clarkson account of events was 'biased, and untrue, definitively insulting for Argentina” and asked the BBC Trust if it effectively believed that the Top Gear team managers had acted according to the book.

The controversy still continues, but apparently ambassador Castro's protests have been to no avail.