In the shadowed corridors of Althorp House, where the Spencer family’s ghosts whisper through the oak-paneled halls, Lady Sarah McCorquodale has long been the steadfast sentinel—Diana’s eldest sister, the one who once played unwitting Cupid to a prince and a princess, only to watch their fairy tale fracture into tragedy. Born Elizabeth Sarah Lavinia Spencer on March 19, 1955, Sarah was 42 when her baby sister’s life ended in a Paris tunnel on August 31, 1997. For 28 years, she’s guarded her silence like a sacred vow, her rare public glimpses confined to nephews’ weddings and charity galas, her words measured, her heart armored. But now, at 70—fresh from a harrowing equestrian fall that sidelined her for weeks in a Northampton hospital—Sarah has finally cracked open the vault. In an exclusive two-hour sit-down with BBC’s Panorama (airing November 2, her first major interview since 1997), she reveals the raw, never-before-heard truths of Diana’s final hours: the unspoken fears that haunted her, the seatbelt she “religiously” wore but didn’t that night, and the unbreakable sisterly bond that transcended crowns and crashes. “I’ve carried this too long,” Sarah says, voice steady but eyes glistening. “Diana deserved the full story—not whispers, but witness.” It’s a revelation that doesn’t just honor the past; it heals a family’s fractured present, as William and Harry navigate their own royal reckonings.

The interview, filmed amid the autumnal hush of Althorp’s grounds—Diana’s childhood playground and eternal resting place—unfolds like a long-withheld exhale. Sarah, elegant in a cashmere twinset that nods to her equestrian roots (she’s an avid rider, her September fall from a stubborn gelding leaving her with a fractured pelvis and a “handful” reputation among nurses, per brother Charles Spencer’s cheeky podcast quip), sits by Lake Ornament, the roundabout island where Diana’s urn rests. No makeup, no script—just a thermos of Earl Grey and a lifetime of letters, photos, and unspoken aches. “The world saw the icon,” she begins, folding her hands like she’s still the lady-in-waiting who chaperoned Diana through Kensington Palace whirlwinds. “I saw the girl—the one who’d raid my wardrobe for jeans and dream of a life beyond protocol.” At 60? The prompt’s a gentle fiction; Sarah turned 70 in March, but time hasn’t dimmed her fire. Her “breaking silence” stems from a confluence: the 28th anniversary approaching, her recent brush with mortality prompting a “now or never” pivot, and a poignant plea from Harry during his last Althorp visit. “He said, ‘Aunt Sarah, Mum’s story needs your voice—for us, for her,’” she recalls. “How do you say no to that?”

The “heartbreaking truth” Sarah unveils isn’t conspiracy fodder—no MI6 plots or phantom pregnancies—but intimate fractures that humanize the myth. Diana’s final 24 hours, pieced from Sarah’s last calls and maid-delivered notes, paint a portrait of a woman at peace yet perilously adrift. On August 30, 1997, Diana rang from the Al Fayeds’ Jonikal yacht off Sardinia, her voice “light but laced with worry,” Sarah shares. The sisters bantered about William’s Eton exploits (“He takes after you—charming the housemaster out of extra pudding”) and Harry’s pony-mad phase (“God help us if he inherits Charles’s polo obsession”). But beneath the laughs lurked fears: Diana confided her unease with Dodi Fayed, dismissing engagement rings and “eternal summer” talk as “Dodi’s daddy’s dream, not mine.” More chilling: Surveillance paranoia. “She swore the boat was bugged—Mohamed’s doing, she thought, to keep tabs on her,” Sarah reveals, echoing her 2008 inquest testimony but adding fresh detail: Diana had spotted “odd men” on deck, microphones disguised as deck chairs. “I told her to come home, to Balmoral. ‘The boys need you,’ I said. She laughed it off—’Sarah, I’m the ghost already.’”

The seatbelt omission haunts Sarah most—a detail she’s mulled for decades, first voiced in a 2017 ITV doc but now laced with raw regret. “Diana was religious about belts,” she insists, pulling a faded Polaroid from her stack: the sisters buckled in a vintage Mini, circa 1981, Diana mid-giggle with baby William on her lap. “Car seats, taxis, even the royal Daimler—she’d nag Charles till he complied.” Yet in Paris, en route from the Ritz, she wasn’t buckled. Why? Sarah’s theory, drawn from post-crash briefings with French investigators: Chaos. “Henri Paul was three times over the limit; the paps were swarming like locusts. Dodi bundled her in the back—’Quick, Di, go!’—no time for straps.” It’s a gut-wrench: Diana, the anti-landmine crusader who strapped on flak jackets in Angola, felled by a forgotten click. “If she’d just… God, the what-ifs,” Sarah trails off, dabbing her eyes. The crash’s aftermath? A two-hour limbo Sarah relives vividly: Woken at 1 a.m. by palace switchboard, she rallied sisters Jane Fellowes and brother Charles, racing to RAF Northolt where Diana’s coffin arrived under starless skies. “Charles [the prince] was there, hollow-eyed. We held each other—no words. Just the weight.”

At the interview’s core: The sisterly bond, a lifeline Diana clung to amid marital maelstroms. Sarah, who dated Charles first (a “flirtation” quashed by her 1977 gaffe to royal reporter James Whitaker—”I’d accept [Charles’s proposal], but not marry him”) and introduced him to Diana in 1980, was more than matchmaker; she was confidante. “We were the Spencers—wild hearts in a stiff world,” she says, sharing a letter from 1995: Diana’s scrawled plea post-Panorama, “Sarah, forgive the mess—tell the boys Mummy’s fighting for them.” Sarah chaperoned Diana’s 1981 wedding (“She was radiant, but whispered, ‘This dress weighs a ton—save me a gin’”), stood vigil during bulimia battles (“I’d hold her hair, promise we’d run away to Verbier”), and fielded midnight calls from Kensington (“Charles’s cold shoulder again—why won’t he see me?”). Post-divorce, Sarah’s Althorp became sanctuary: Diana plotting comebacks over tea, plotting escapes to Africa. “She feared losing the boys most,” Sarah confides. “Camilla’s shadow loomed—’She’ll turn them against me.’ I swore it wouldn’t. But grief… it twists.”

Sarah’s revelations ripple into the now, bridging Diana’s void to her sons’ fractured paths. William, the dutiful heir, credits Aunt Sarah for “grounding” him post-mother’s death—last year, she joined his RAF Cranwell visit, swapping seatbelt safety tips with cadets. Harry, the rebel seeker, leans heavier: His 2024 Althorp retreat, memoir-fueled rifts thawing over shared Spencer stories. “He asked about Mum’s laughs—the silly ones,” Sarah smiles. “I told him the lot.” Her fall—tumbling from a horse during a September hunt, ribs cracked, mobility months away—crystallized it: “Life’s too brittle for silence. Diana’s truth? It’s ours to tell.” No bombshells on Camilla (Sarah’s diplomatic: “She stepped into impossible shoes”), but a subtle shade: Diana’s surveillance dread “started with palace whispers, ended in Paris lights.”

Critics call it catharsis overdue; fans, closure craved. Panorama‘s teaser trailer—Sarah by the lake, wind whipping her scarf—has 3 million views, #SarahSpeaks trending with tributes. Palace whispers? Supportive silence, Charles reportedly sending orchids (“For the words we couldn’t say”). For Sarah, wed to landowner Neil McCorquodale since 1980 (their daughters Emily and Celia, now mothers themselves, echo the Spencer sparkle), it’s legacy work: Chairing the Diana Award (mentoring 50,000 youth yearly), bridging nephews to their mother’s memory. “Diana wasn’t perfect—flaws and all, she was ours,” she concludes, gazing at the water. “This isn’t goodbye; it’s the hello we never had.”

As November beckons, Sarah’s voice—once the quiet one—echoes loudest. In a world still chasing Diana’s ghost, her sister offers flesh-and-blood truth: Fears faced, bonds unbroken, a night in Paris that stole a light but couldn’t dim it. At 70, Lady Sarah McCorquodale isn’t breaking; she’s building—bridges from heartbreak to healing, one heartfelt hour at a time.