London, Nov 7 : Experts are certain that the Mercedes carrying Princess Diana in Paris 10 years ago collided with a white Fiat Uno before it crashed, the inquest into her death has heard.

Scotland Yard senior collision investigator PC Anthony Read and two other experts concluded that fragments of the smashed rear light of a 1980s Fiat Uno found at the crash scene and traces of white paint on the wreck of the Mercedes showed the incident did take place.

Diana, her lover Dodi Fayed and their driver Henri Paul were all killed when their car hit a pillar of the Pont de l'Alma Underpass in Paris on the morning of August 31, 1997.

Read presented the jury with four bags of debris retrieved from the tunnel within a few hours of the crash.

One bag contained 55 pieces of clear plastic from the headlamp of the Mercedes itself while three other bags had a total of 21 red fragments from the rear light of a Fiat Uno made between May 1983 and September 1989 inside.

The car has never been conclusively traced, reports the Scotsman.

However, Read, who assisted former Metropolitan Police chief Lord Stevens's investigation into the Princess's death, said that it would have been "virtually impossible" for someone trying to cause such a crash deliberately to be sure of success.

Dodi’s father, Harrods owner Mohamed al Fayed, is convinced that the Fiat played a crucial role in a plot to murder Diana by staging a car crash.

But Read, who produced a joint report with two other experts, said that anyone doing so would have risked their lives as well in a crash with a car twice the weight of the Fiat.

He further told the jury he believed the crash would have been "survivable" if Diana and Dodi had been wearing seatbelts.

He also told the court the wreck of the Mercedes had been brought to the UK and examined with no defects found which would have contributed to the crash and no signs of being tampered with. (ANI)