Virginia mother still missing after 2022 crash in NC. Here’s the latest on investigation

Alcohol, an explosive crash and jurisdictional boundaries that left a family to lead the search for a missing woman make for a unique case, experts said.

Truck driver Danny McNeal, 51, was carrying a load of frozen chicken from Delaware to North Carolina on Interstate 85 on Sept. 14, 2022, when he crashed into a pile supporting a bridge in Orange County. The truck’s fuel tanks exploded, sending up a fireball and thick smoke.

McNeal and his dog, Blu, were killed, and the crash shut down southbound I-85 most of the day. The bridge at N.C. 86 in Hillsborough was closed for another 10 days to make structural repairs.

An autopsy later showed McNeal had a blood-alcohol content of 0.32 — four times North Carolina’s legal limit for being impaired, and eight times the legal limit for someone with a commercial driver’s license.

Alyssa Taylor’s family learned about the crash Sept. 20 and contacted the N.C. Highway Patrol, certain that Alyssa, 25, had been in the truck.

The mother of two boys had told her family she was leaving Exmore, Virginia, with McNeal on Sept. 13.

She has not been heard from since.

What was unusual about the crash?

McNeal’s truck ran off I-85 around 2:12 a.m. Sept. 14, hitting a guardrail and an exit sign.

The trailer and cab flipped over, according to a Highway Patrol report obtained by The N&O. The truck hit the bridge, burst into flames and exploded multiple times, reports said.

That’s unusual, because federal rules require tractor-trailer diesel tanks to take a certain amount of force, said Adam Hyde, director of the Northwestern University Center for Public Safety’s Traffic Crash Investigation and Safety Engineering division.

“That’s a pretty good hit to start the truck on fire and do this damage,” Hyde said.

An autopsy showed McNeal, a commercial driver since 2020, died from blunt-force injuries and burns, but acute ethanol intoxication was a contributing factor. Video surveillance footage showed McNeal buying alcohol at a store that night, it stated.

As much as a 12-pack of beer might be required to reach a 0.32 intoxication level in a couple of hours, depending on a person’s body weight and drinking habits, said Thomas Kash, director of UNC’s Bowles Center for Alcohol Studies. Higher-proof liquor takes less time.

An average person might black out or even die at that level, which is “extraordinarily high,” Kash said. A heavier person or more frequent drinker could adapt over time, he said.

“Your liver can get better at breaking down alcohol,” Kash said. “You can develop a tolerance, so the concentration or amount of alcohol that would normally inhibit or turn off part of the brain, it would take much more to turn off that part of the brain.”

But, only a couple of drinks can make a commercial driver too intoxicated to drive legally, he said. In any case, people “should never drink and drive,” he said. “That’s the horrible postscript of this.”

Court records showed that McNeal was charged in 2015 with misdemeanor reckless driving, but that charge was dismissed in court. He also pleaded guilty that year in a separate case to being drunk in public.

What happened to Alyssa Taylor?

Alyssa Taylor’s family has tried to get more help from law enforcement, but the case didn’t get any traction initially because her body wasn’t found in the wreckage. Her family fears she was in the explosion and burned so badly that her remains were missed among the chickens, which were scooped up in the pre-dawn darkness and taken to a landfill in Sampson County.

Highway Patrol officials only dealt with the crash, because the agency does not investigate missing persons, a spokesman has said.

Lt. Joshua Marsh of the Accomack County Sheriff’s Office said they continue to investigate Taylor’s disappearance in Virginia but lack jurisdiction to investigate what happened in North Carolina. The Patrol would have to ask Virginia’s FBI office to get involved, he said.

The N.C. Highway Patrol has completed its investigation and closed the case, spokesman 1st Sgt. Christopher Knox has said. The Orange County Sheriff’s Office doesn’t have the authority to conduct an independent investigation, spokeswoman Alicia Stemper has said.

So in North Carolina, Alyssa’s aunt, Lori Taylor, has taken the lead, searching the crash site with Alyssa’s mother and another aunt and poring over the wreckage, where they found a singed, ash-encrusted pink blanket and an Old Navy sandal.

They filed a missing person report on Sept. 21 in Accomack County and have repeatedly traveled to North Carolina to gather official reports and comb through debris. They were livestreaming during a Sept. 29, 2022, visit when Lori Taylor spied a silver earring in a storm sewer under the N.C. 86 bridge. Reaching down, she retrieved the large metal teardrop from the leaves and debris.

“Oh my God! It’s her earring!” Alyssa’s mom Krista Taylor exclaimed.

They kept digging until nightfall, filling a plastic shopping bag with metal scraps, insulation and bits of what looked like bone and hair or fur to give to the Accomack County Sheriff’s Office. They erected a small memorial before going home.

They don’t believe any North Carolina law enforcement agency will follow up, Lori Taylor said at the time.

“They didn’t even dig down this friggin’ far, and there’s a piece of an earring down here in this drain,” she said.

What has law enforcement done?

The investigation was hampered initially because no one knew Alyssa was in the truck, and then jurisdiction rules that make the crash a Highway Patrol case kept other local, state and federal agencies from getting involved.

The Highway Patrol’s specialized Collision Reconstruction Unit conducted additional forensic tests, looking closely at the wreckage, the crash scene and in the landfill, Knox has said.

They also shared information with Accomack County and other agencies, he said.

“While we cannot provide further specifics as to the investigative techniques and findings, we can say that a comprehensive process has taken place,” Knox said.

Marsh said the Accomack County Sheriff’s Office was told “everything was triple checked, and no further human remains were located.”

Hyde said it’s unlikely Alyssa would have fallen out of the passenger window, even if she were sleeping in the truck’s cab. Bodies react to crashes in consistent ways, he said.

“As the truck was tipping, her body would be moving (forward), and the truck would fall (toward the ground) out from under her, so she shouldn’t go out the windows or hit the side door for sure,” he said.

Her body could have been burned, but it’s hard to determine, Hyde said, and finding evidence of her remains in the wreckage would be “a tedious process.”

The best approach might be comparing her cell phone with the truck’s GPS data, although it shows an average over time, instead of a moment in time, he said. The data could be manipulated to find answers, he said.

Alyssa’s cell phone has not been found.

NC Reality Check is an N&O series holding those in power accountable and shining a light on public issues that affect the Triangle or North Carolina. Have a suggestion for a future story? Email realitycheck@newsobserver.com