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Angela Chao, shipping company CEO and sister-in-law of outgoing Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, was drunk when she crashed her Tesla into a lake on a Texas farm in a fatal crash last month, according to the Blanco County Sheriff’s Office.
The 62-page incident report offers harrowing details of the night of Feb. 10, when, after partying with friends, Chao accidentally overturned into a lake and became trapped in her car.
He called his friend for help and “said goodbye” as the water level in the car continued to rise, the report said. Friends tried desperately but failed to get her out of the car in time, and emergency responders eventually pulled her lifeless body out of the car.
Toxicology found that Chao’s blood alcohol content was 0.233, or nearly three times the legal limit. The Cleveland Clinic says levels between 0.15 and 0.3 can cause someone to “experience confusion, vomiting, and drowsiness.”
The report determined that her death was an “unfortunate accident”.
Chao’s death has assumed special significance given his proximity to power. She was the CEO of shipping company Foremost Group and the sister of former Trump administration Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao, who is married to McConnell. The 82-year-old Republican senator noted his sister-in-law’s death last month when he announced his plans to step down as GOP leader.
“As some of you may know, this has been a particularly difficult time for my family. We tragically lost Ellen’s little sister, Angela, just a few weeks ago,” he said. “When you lose a loved one, especially at a young age, there is a certain introspection that accompanies the grieving process. Perhaps this is God’s way of reminding you of your life’s journey to reprioritize the impact of the world we will all inevitably leave behind.
According to the report, Chao, a Harvard graduate who lived in Austin, gathered with a group of friends for the weekend and attended a Pitbull concert on Friday, February 9. The next day, the group spent the day visiting her family farm in Johnson City, the report said.
The group had dinner and drinks at the guest lodge, and around 11:30, everyone began returning to their bedrooms or going home.
According to the report, video from an exterior South Side camera captured Chao “walking unsteadily toward her vehicle while holding her cellular phone in her right hand” at 11:37 p.m.
Chao was later seen entering his Tesla. The camera captured the car careening toward a wooden barrier, overturning, turning left without stopping, and passing over the limestone block wall, the report said. After this the car entered Water. A minute later, the vehicle’s lights were no longer visible.
While inside, Chao called a friend for help, and others came to try to save him.
At 11:42 p.m., a friend received a call from Chao and reported that “he had crashed his vehicle into the pond,” the report said. The friend asked Chao to leave the car, but she said she couldn’t do that, the friend later told law enforcement.
The friend remained on the phone with Chao for eight minutes as she described flooding in the vehicle, authorities said in the report. I also found a friend He got into a kayak and walked toward the vehicle, and another friend swam to the car, climbed over it and tried to reach Chao, authorities said in the report.
Just after midnight, deputies arrived at the farm.
The ranch manager told deputies that the back door of the Tesla was open, after which he “attempted several times to locate the occupant of the vehicle through the rear passenger door, but was unable to.”
The report said he attempted unsuccessfully to break the front windshield and ultimately broke the driver’s side window.
Once the window was broken, deputies said they swam down and felt a hand, and with the help of a medic, pulled Chao from the submerged vehicle. The vehicle remained in water for approximately 21 minutes.
“The paramedics then swam with the body back to shore and began performing CPR,” according to the report.
First responders declared Chao dead at 1:40 a.m. An autopsy was not performed, with the family citing religious reasons, the report said.
CNN’s Rebekah Reiss and Eric Levenson contributed to this story.
