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Photos: The incident that ended Ted Kennedy’s presidential hopes 50 years ago

Kennedy’s White House aspirations didn’t survive fateful plunge into the water at Chappaquiddick

  • FILE - In this July 19, 1969 file photograph, crowds...

    FILE - In this July 19, 1969 file photograph, crowds watch as U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy's car is pulled from water at the Dyke Bridge in Edgartown, Mass. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo, File)

  • FILE - In this July 20, 1969 file photograph, undertakers...

    FILE - In this July 20, 1969 file photograph, undertakers wheel the body of Mary Jo Kopechne, 29, to a waiting hearse at the Scranton-Wilkes Barre airport in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Kopechne drowned after a car driven by U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy plunged off a bridge on Martha's Vineyard. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo, File)

  • FILE - In this July 18, 1969 file photograph, curious...

    FILE - In this July 18, 1969 file photograph, curious onlookers inspect U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy's car in Edgartown, Mass. Mary Jo Kopechne drowned after Kennedy drove the car off Dyke Bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, Mass. on July 18, 1969. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo, File)

  • FILE -- In this July 19, 1969 file photograph, U.S....

    FILE -- In this July 19, 1969 file photograph, U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy's car is pulled from the water at Edgartown, Mass. Mary Jo Kopechne was drowned after Kennedy drove his car off Dyke Bridge on Chappaquiddick Island. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo, File)

  • Reporters question American Senator Edward Kennedy (center, with neck brace)...

    Reporters question American Senator Edward Kennedy (center, with neck brace) and his wife Joan Kennedy (left, in white coat and dark glasses) as they walk across the tarmac after returning from the funeral of Mary Jo Kopechne, Hyannis, Massachusetts, July 22, 1969. Kopechne died when a car driven by Kennedy went over the side of a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island four days earlier. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

  • FILE - In this July 22, 1969 file photograph, U.S...

    FILE - In this July 22, 1969 file photograph, U.S Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., arrives back home in Hyannis, Mass., after attending the funeral of Mary Jo Kopechne in Pennsylvania. Kopechne drowned when a car driven by Kennedy went off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, at the eastern end of Martha's Vineyard. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo/Frank C. Curtin, File)

  • FILE - In this file photograph from 1969, skid marks...

    FILE - In this file photograph from 1969, skid marks and deck damage is seen on the Dyke Bridge on Chappaquiddick Island in Edgartown, Mass., where U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy's car plunged off the bridge. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo, File)

  • FILE -- In this July 29, 1969 file photograph, U.S....

    FILE -- In this July 29, 1969 file photograph, U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy, dark glasses, talks on phone on the dock at the Kennedy compound prior to boarding the yacht Marlin with other members of the Kennedy family for a cruise off Hyannis Port, Massachusetts. Kennedy had been in seclusion at his Squaw Island following an accident on Chappaquiddick Island were a passenger drowned. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo/Bill Chaplis, File)

  • FILE - In this July 25, 1969 file image from...

    FILE - In this July 25, 1969 file image from a television broadcast, U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., makes a national address concerning the controversy surrounding an accident which claimed the life of Mary Jo Kopechne. It's been 50 years since the fateful automobile accident that killed a woman and thwarted Kennedy's presidential aspirations. (AP Photo, File)

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Mark DuFrene, Bay Area News Group Deputy Photo Editor , is photographed for his Wordpress profile in Pleasanton, Calif., on Thursday, July 28, 2016. (Doug Duran/Bay Area News Group)
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On July 18, 1969, after leaving a party, U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy’s steered his Oldsmobile sedan off a narrow bridge on Chappaquiddick Island on the eastern end of Martha’s Vineyard.

His passenger, 28-year-old Mary Jo Kopechne, a former campaign worker for Robert Kennedy, who had been  assassinated the previous year in Los Angeles during the Democratic presidential primary, drowned. Kennedy said he tried to rescue Kopechne from the submerged car.

Kennedy waited 10 hours before reporting the accident to police, citing shock and a concussion. Kennedy eventually pleaded guilty to leaving the scene of an accident, receiving a suspended sentence of two months in jail.

Kennedy remained in the U.S. Senate until his death in 2009.