Home » News » Grace Kelly: The truth about the fatal car accident and the unanswered questions – 2024-09-15 11:01:55

Grace Kelly: The truth about the fatal car accident and the unanswered questions – 2024-09-15 11:01:55

Tragedy struck the royal family of Monaco on September 13, 1982, when Grace Kelly was involved in a tragic car accident.

Grace Kelly suffered a stroke while driving home to Monaco with her then 17-year-old daughter Princess Stephanie. He lost control of the car and at high speed fell from a steep peak into a 120 meter ravine. The car overturned and both were seriously injured.

Grace Kelly and Stephanie were rushed to the hospital. Princess Grace had suffered multiple internal injuries and severe head injuries and Stephanie had fractured her spine.

Despite efforts, doctors were unable to treat the brain hemorrhage. On September 14, 1982, shortly before 11:00 p.m., Grace Kelly was announced to her family as brain dead..

It was her husband, Rainier, who gave his approval for the mechanical support to stop. Grace Kelly was dead. In two months he would have turned 53. He didn’t make it.

“He was never the same person as before the accident,” Alberto’s son would say years later in one of his rare interviews, on the show In Depth.

Grace Kelly and Rainier of Monaco

In that confession he also mentioned to his sisters Carolina and Stephanie and how his mother’s death irreparably affected their lives. Many argue that the joint – and smiling – public appearances of the two brothers hide behind a relationship that was never restored.

“It took Stephanie too many years to recover. It was for her the most painful memory. He was in the car with our mother unable to help her, unable to extricate her, unable to prevent the fatality.

She was also seriously injured in the accident, but the loss was her greatest trauma,” said Albert of Monaco.

«We were having our breakfast when our father came and told us that there had been an accident. He told us that we had to go to the hospital because mother and Stephanie had been hit. Without thinking anything I left with him and Carolina and we went to the hospital.

Prince Albert with his wife, Charlene, in a photo exhibition featuring Grace Kelly. Photo Credits: AP Photo/Philadelphia Inquirer, Michael Bryant

It was a shocking moment when we arrived. One of those situations where you don’t know what to think.

You think maybe things aren’t that serious, that the accident wasn’t that serious. Hours with intensity and emotion. Late that night we realized that the development was not going to be good“, he confesses about those unbearable moments.

OR Crown spoke about the effects of her mother’s death in a 2015 interview with French publication Point de Vue.

“After I got over my anger, I overcame the feeling of injustice inside me, instead of feeling sorry for myselfI said, “Wait. Logically, you should have died too.” If they kept me alive, it was for a reason. You have a place in this world. You have to find him,” he said.

Who was really driving the car?

One thing we do know for sure is that the accident happened while Princess Grace and Princess Stephanie were returning from their Roc Agel holiday in a Rover P6 3500.

Who was behind the wheel is a question that still plagues public opinion. One rumor claims that Stephanie, not Grace, was driving, which would be a problem because Stephanie didn’t have a driver’s license.

A witness claimed to have seen Stephanie driving. In addition, Stephanie was ejected from the driver’s side of the car, which fueled the rumors.

“The passenger door was completely smashed,” she said, according to the Guardian. “I got out the only accessible side, the driver’s side.”

To this day, Stephanie stubbornly denies that she was driving.

Why would Princess Grace Kelly drive?

Grace Kelly was known to detest driving. After a car accident in Monaco in the 1970s, he had vowed never to drive again and was therefore chauffeured.

According to an excerpt from the book “Rainier and Grace: An Intimate Portrait” published in the Chicago Tribune, the back seat of the Rover was filled with dresses and hats, leaving no room for Grace Kelly and her daughter.

The chauffeur is said to have even offered to make a second run for the clothes, so why then grace insisted she would drive anywayespecially since the way back was a very difficult descent down the mountain?

Maybe they didn’t catch the brakes?

A witness claimed to have seen the car moving erratically and going down the mountain at an “alarming speed”.

Stephanie later told her sister, Carolina, that as the car spun out of control, Grace Kelly was yelling, “The brakes don’t work. I can’t stop». However, British Leyland, the manufacturer of the Rover P6 3500, issued an official announcement that the particular car had been fitted with a dual brake system.

A motorcyclist who was right behind Grace’s vehicle observed for some time that the car was making dangerous maneuvers stating that its driver was drunk or asleep.

Did Princess Grace mistake the brake pedal for the accelerator?

Princess Stephanie asked this very question: “Did my mother mistake the brake pedal for the accelerator? I don’t know.” We may never know the truth.

Were mother and daughter fighting at the time of the accident?

Some believe that Grace had not lost control of the car, but rather of her emotions. That summer, mother and daughter had an ongoing argument about the latter’s plans to marry her then-boyfriend, Paul, Belmondo’s son.

If the dispute had escalated that day, that could explain the “reckless driving.” It could even explain why anyone driving might mistake the brake pedal for the accelerator.

Her funeral took place on September 18, 1982 in the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception in Monaco, the same one where her wedding took place in 1956, in the presence of 800 invited guests. 100 million viewers worldwide watched the ceremony.

In an interview with Pierre Salinger on June 22, 1982, Grace Kelly would say:

«I would like to be remembered as a person who tries to do his job well. That I show understanding and that I am kind. I would like to be remembered as a decent and loving person.”

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