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Tomorrow is the 25th anniversary of Princess Diana’s death.

Even after all this time, Dr Frederic Mailliez still thinks about that tragic night on August 31, 1997, in the Alma Tunnel in Paris.

He was one of the last people to see the Princess alive, and despite not recognising who she was at the time, did everything he could to save her.

The French doctor found her scrunched up on the floor of the mangled Mercedes, which had almost split in two, unconscious and struggling to breathe.

Her death sparked a wave of public grief, one that a quarter-century later, still grips Mailliez as he recounts the scene per The Associated Press:

“I realize my name will always be attached to this tragic night,” Mailliez, who was on his way home from a party when he came across the car crash, told The Associated Press. “I feel a little bit responsible for her last moments.”

…The anniversary is stirring up those memories again, but they also come back “each time I drive through the Alma Tunnel,” he said.

That night, when he walked towards the wreckage, opened the door, and looked inside, his life changed forever:

“Four people, two of them were apparently dead, no reaction, no breathing, and the two others, on the right side, were living but in severe condition. The front passenger was screaming, he was breathing. He could wait a few minutes. And the female passenger, the young lady, was on her knees on the floor of the Mercedes, she had her head down. She had difficulty to breathe. She needed quick assistance.”

He ran to his car to call emergency services and grab a respiratory bag.

“She was unconscious,” he said. “Thanks to my respiratory bag (…) she regained a little bit more energy, but she couldn’t say anything.”

It was only much later that he found out he was treating a British national treasure adored by millions.

He said he tried to comfort her, realising she spoke English, and tried to work around the flash of camera bulbs from the paparazzi that had gathered to document the scene:

Mailliez said he had “no reproach” toward the photographers’ actions after the crash.

“They didn’t hamper me having access to the victims. … I didn’t ask them for help, but they didn’t interfere with my job.”

A British inquest found Diana’s chauffeur, Henri Paul, was drunk and driving at a high speed to get away from the photographers chasing them. Paul died, as well as Diana’s partner Dodi Fayed, the son of Harrods owner Mohamed Al Fayed.

Diana’s former bodyguard, Lee Sansum, recently claimed she would have survived the accident if he had been on duty.

“It was a massive shock to learn that she was Princess Diana, and that she died,” Mailliez said. Then self-doubt set in.

“Did I do everything I could to save her? Did I do correctly my job?” he asked himself. “I checked with my medical professors and I checked with police investigators,” he said, and they agreed he did all he could.

In a new documentary series, Investigating Diana: Death In Paris, it’s reported that detectives from the 1997 French Brigade Criminelle are obsessing over an untraced white Fiat Uno that was there at the time of the crash.

Sky News notes that the driver of the Uno could potentially have helped explain the movements of the black Mercedes, shedding some light on the Princess’ last moments:

Eric Gigou, also of the Brigade Criminelle, said authorities “did everything we could to understand what happened” and more than 1,000 people were interviewed in the investigation by the French authorities.

“In my mind the only door that remains open is the testimony of the driver of the Fiat Uno,” he said.

As Martine Monteil, head of the Brigade Criminelle says, “the whole of the world has struggled to accept that the Princess of Wales died in a mundane accident”.

A mysterious note dubbed the “Mishcon Note” also has some questioning details surrounding her death.

[sources:apnews&skynews]