Mum, 32, dies after she drove home from night out 'significantly' drunk

A young mum who got behind the wheel after she had been out drinking crashed her car into a tree and died. Sarah Smith had been celebrating passing her exams to become a paramedic earlier in the evening.

The army veteran, 32, was “significantly intoxicated” when she got into her Audi A1 on the night of October 14 last year, an inquest heard. She lost control of her car as she drove around the right-hand bend in West Paddock, Leyland, heading in the direction of Tesco, and across a grassed area before smashing into a tree.

Sarah was taken by ambulance to Royal Preston Hospital after firefighters cut her from her car, LancsLive reports. Surgeons operated on her to try and repair her heavily damaged liver, however she was pronounced dead the next day.

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At an inquest held on Monday (February 27) at Preston Coroner's Court, collision investigator PC Brendan Williams revealed that an examination of Sarah's car found no defects and she had been wearing her seatbelt at the time of the crash. Marks on the road and grassed area indicated that she had not attempted to brake after her car left the road.

"The vehicle had left the road to its offside, hit the kerb, travelled across the grass then across the junction with Jubilee Court before colliding with a tree," PC Williams said. "There weren't any witnesses but there was some CCTV from a property which showed the latter stage of the collision.

"The vehicle had just negotiated a right-hand bend. It just appeared that the driver had continued to turn right and then left the road. There was no attempt to return back to the carriageway and no evidence the vehicle was braking.

"If a vehicle is braking