US shale pioneer Aubrey McClendon hit speeds of 89 miles an hour just before his Chevy Tahoe slammed into a concrete bridge earlier this month in a fatal crash, according to a report issued Monday afternoon by the Oklahoma City Police Dept.
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The data, which was pulled from a black box inside the fracking magnate’s auto, gave scant details of the last five seconds of McClendon’s life before the head-on impact, which caused the vehicle to erupt in a ball of flames.
The police report said McClendon was not wearing a seat belt at the time of the crash and although he did tap the brakes he apparently did not attempt to turn. “You don’t know what was going on in the cabin of the vehicle”, he said. He tapped on his brakes several times, but that was not enough to slow the vehicle down.
The day before he died, Mr. McClendon was indicted on a federal antitrust charge after a lengthy U.S. Justice Department investigation.
“I’m not going to speculate on what the tapping of the brake means”, he said.
When asked if there was any evidence that his death could be ruled a suicide, Citty said he couldn’t answer for that.
He was also a co-owner of the NBA’s Oklahoma City Thunder basketball team.
McClendon had left that firm to launch a rival energy company. Investigators will be looking to review his cell phone records, emails, and events leading up to his death.
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McClendon had denied accusations that while at Chesapeake he hampered competition by orchestrating a conspiracy between two large oil and gas companies to not bid against each other for the purchase of certain oil and natural gas leases in northwest Oklahoma.
