In a deeply moving account that has reignited public emotion around Princess Diana’s tragic death, French firefighter Xavier Gourmelon—among the first responders at the scene of her fatal car crash—has shared how he believed he had saved her life after performing CPR in the wreckage
In a deeply moving account that has reignited public emotion around Princess Diana’s tragic death, French firefighter Xavier Gourmelon—among the first responders at the scene of her fatal car crash—has shared how he believed he had saved her life after performing CPR in the wreckage of the mangled Mercedes in Paris’s Pont de l’Alma tunnel.
On the night of August 31, 1997, Gourmelon and his team rushed to the crash site, where they found a blonde woman conscious in the backseat of the destroyed vehicle. He did not initially realize the woman was Princess Diana. “When I first saw her, she was conscious and her eyes were open,” Gourmelon recalled. “She asked me, ‘My God, what’s happened?’”
Gourmelon held Diana’s hand, told her to stay calm, and assured her that help had arrived. At that moment, she seemed stable, and he did not believe her life was in immediate danger. But just minutes later, Diana went into cardiac arrest. Gourmelon immediately performed chest compressions and massaged her heart until she began breathing again.
“It was a relief – I thought we had saved her,” Gourmelon said. “As far as I knew when she left in the ambulance, she was alive.” He didn’t learn until later at the hospital that Diana had died from her injuries, and he described the news as “very hard to take”.
The firefighter admitted he did not recognize Diana at the scene. A paramedic informed him of her identity only after she had been placed in the ambulance. “I was completely stunned,” he expressed. “I recognized her, but I don’t follow British royalty closely. When I approached the ambulance and peered inside, that’s when it clicked”.
Diana’s final words, as remembered by Gourmelon, were her confused and startled question: “My God, what’s happened?” He held her hand, tried to comfort her, and believed his quick actions had given her a chance at survival. Tragically, Diana died shortly after arriving at the hospital from severe internal injuries.
Gourmelon’s account stands as one of the most intimate eyewitness testimonies of Diana’s final moments, capturing both the hope of a first responder who thought he had saved a life and the crushing grief of learning too late that the woman he treated was the Princess of Wales, beloved by millions worldwide.
