All of us have unhealthy days at work, however the Lancia workforce at Stellantis’ plant in Sochaux, France, had a very, actually robust one in the present day. That’s as a result of not solely have images of one in all their take a look at autos leaked, satirically, the automotive was additionally fully submerged.

The automobile in query is the upcoming 2025 Lancia Ypsilon (although it could be marketed as a 2024 mannequin in Europe). Whereas we’ve seen it testing earlier than, it has at all times been lined by a bunch of camouflage. Now, due to an unlucky joyride that led to a canal, we get to see an entire lot extra of it.

Authorities have been first alerted to troubles at round 7:30 a.m. native time this morning, when firefighters within the Montbeliard area have been referred to as to rescue a automotive whose roof might be seen poking out of the water, experiences the Est Republicain. They rapidly rounded up some divers, in an effort to seek out the individuals concerned on this incident. Thankfully, they discovered nobody within the automotive or close to it.

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Authorities then referred to as a tow firm to get the automotive out of the water. Few on the scene seemingly realized that by doing that, they might be revealing Lancia commerce secrets and techniques. Nevertheless, because the automotive was pulled out of the canal, it grew to become clear that this was a pre-production Ypsilon, which is about to debut in February 2024.

Though the pictures that have been taken by French photographer Lionel Vadam aren’t fairly as detailed as we’re used to from our spy photographers (this was, in any case, a rescue mission), they’re nonetheless revealing. We are able to see that home windows are surrounded by black cladding, just like the wheel arches, and that it’ll have spherical, Pu+Ra concept-inspired taillights which might be additionally surrounded by darkish materials.

The bulbous, hatchback form is paying homage to camouflaged Ypsilons we’ve seen testing earlier than, and roughly as anticipated. Primarily based on the e-CMP platform, the Ypsilon is predicted to get a single 154 hp (115 kW/156 PS) motor powered by a 51 kWh battery pack, that would give drivers round 248 miles (400 km) of vary.

As to how this instance got here to seek out itself underwater, the reply is unclear. Nevertheless, the Est Republicain experiences that the automobile was stolen. Sadly, it affords no additional particulars about how that occurred. We’ll hold a watch out for extra info because it turns into out there.