FINAL DETOUR: Diogo Jota Canceled His Plane Ticket Just 68 Minutes Before Crash — Was It Fate or a Last-Minute Shift? 🛫🛣️💭
He wasn’t supposed to be driving that day. What led him to change plans — and head into the storm?

Early in the morning of Thursday, July 3rd, Liverpool and Portugal forward Diogo Jota and his brother died in an auto accident in Spain. The initial reactions were, naturally, shock and dismay. Details of the accident have since begun to be shared by sources in Spain, painting an even more tragic picture.

Jota and brother Andre Silva, a striker for Portuguese Liga 2 side FC Penafiel, were travelling to Santander in Spain, with Jota planning to catch a ferry to Plymouth in England ahead of his return to Liverpool for pre-season. He had been advised to avoid air travel due to undergoing a recent lung surgery.

Their car left the road and then caught fire in a remote and largely unpopulated region of northern Zamora in Spain when a tire exploded while overtaking another driver on Highway A52. There were no others in the car with Jota and his brother, and the other car was not impacted by the accident.

Spain’s Guardia Civil said the accident occurred early in the morning of Thursday at around 12:30AM local time. Their destination, the port at Santander, was around 300km from the crash site. Ferries make the 20-hour journey to Plymouth at 4PM local time on Thursday and Monday afternoons.

The crash site lies around half way to Santander from Porto, where Jota journeyed via the same route earlier in the summer for his wedding with childhood sweetheart Rute Cardoso. It is not known if Jota and his brother intended to complete the trip overnight or planned a stop before reaching the port.

Jota and Cardoso married on June 22nd. The couple had three children together. Following the accident, numerous local fans have made the journey to Anfield to leave tributes for the player while former players as well current teammates of Jota with club and country have sent messages of condolence.