Incident location, Long Island
What Happened
A 43-year-old man was killed early Wednesday morning after being struck by three separate vehicles while walking on the North Service Road of the Long Island Expressway in Jericho, according to Nassau County police. The grim sequence of collisions unfolded around 6 a.m. on November 19, 2025, leaving the unidentified victim dead at the scene and prompting a lengthy road closure that stretched well into the late morning hours.
According to the New York Daily News, the victim was walking eastbound on the North Service Road near Open Street when he was first struck by a 2023 Mazda being driven by a 79-year-old man. The collision, which occurred in the pre-dawn darkness of a November morning, set off a devastating chain of events that would involve two more vehicles in rapid succession before emergency responders could intervene.
Shortly after the initial impact, the same pedestrian was struck a second time — this time by a 2021 Alfa Romeo driven by a 48-year-old man, the New York Daily News reports. Before the scene could be secured, a third vehicle — a 2014 Mazda operated by a 40-year-old woman — also struck the victim. Nassau County police confirmed all three strikes as part of the same fatal event. None of the three drivers involved have been publicly identified by name at this time.
Despite the severity of the incident, all three drivers stopped their vehicles and remained at the scene, cooperating with responding officers. Emergency medical personnel pronounced the pedestrian dead at the scene. The identities of both the victim and the three drivers have not been released by Nassau County police, and no hometowns for those involved were included in initial reports.
Nassau County police’s homicide squad responded to the scene to lead the investigation, a standard procedure in fatalities that may involve criminal culpability. Traffic on the North Service Road was temporarily halted in full while investigators worked the scene, documented physical evidence, and interviewed the drivers involved. The service road — a heavily traveled corridor running parallel to the Long Island Expressway — was reopened to traffic at approximately noon, roughly six hours after the first collision occurred, per the New York Daily News report.
No official quotes from investigators or witnesses were included in the initial report. Police have not released information regarding the speed of any of the vehicles involved, the lighting or road surface conditions at the time of the crashes, or whether any of the drivers are suspected of impairment. The cause of the fatal event — including why the victim was on foot on the service road in the early morning hours — has not been established in early reports.
Location & Road Context
The crash occurred on the North Service Road of the Long Island Expressway near Open Street in Jericho, a hamlet in Nassau County. The LIE service roads run parallel to the main expressway and are used heavily by local commuters, delivery drivers, and residents accessing businesses and neighborhoods adjacent to one of Long Island’s busiest highways. Early morning hours along this corridor typically see a mix of commercial and commuter traffic, and the darkness of a 6 a.m. November morning — well before sunrise — creates inherently reduced visibility conditions for both drivers and pedestrians.
The North Service Road in this section of Jericho is not a pedestrian-oriented roadway, and foot traffic along the shoulder near an expressway interchange poses significant risk, particularly in low-light conditions. The Open Street intersection near the site of the crash sits in a dense commercial and transitional zone just off the LIE, where vehicle speeds can be inconsistent as drivers enter and exit the highway corridor.
Investigation & Legal Proceedings
Nassau County’s homicide squad has taken over the investigation into the triple-vehicle fatality, a designation that does not necessarily indicate criminal intent but reflects the protocol for any incident resulting in a death that may involve vehicular culpability. As reported by the New York Daily News, the investigation remains active and ongoing as of the evening of November 19, 2025. No charges have been filed against any of the three drivers, and police have indicated it is unclear whether any criminal charges will follow.
All three drivers — the 79-year-old man behind the wheel of the first 2023 Mazda, the 48-year-old man driving the 2021 Alfa Romeo, and the 40-year-old woman operating the 2014 Mazda — remained voluntarily at the scene, a factor that investigators will weigh as they assess each driver’s conduct individually. Detectives will likely review vehicle damage, road markings, surveillance footage if available, and witness statements to determine the sequence of events and whether any driver bears legal responsibility for the pedestrian’s death.
Broader Impact
Early morning pedestrian accidents on Long Island expressway service roads present a uniquely dangerous profile: drivers traveling at or near highway speeds on roads not designed with pedestrian infrastructure, combined with the low visibility of pre-sunrise November conditions, can make even a stationary hazard extremely difficult to detect and avoid in time. This incident — in which one pedestrian was struck not once but three times by separate vehicles within the span of minutes — underscores the extreme danger of pedestrian exposure on high-speed service roads adjacent to the LIE, and may prompt Nassau County to review pedestrian access and lighting conditions along this stretch of the North Service Road near Jericho.