Elvin Hernandez

Elvin Hernandez was a highway maintenance worker for the Connecticut Department of Transportation who was killed on the morning of September 25, 2026, while performing road work on Interstate 95 in Fairfield, Connecticut. He was 60 years old. State officials said he was struck by a vehicle involved in a multi vehicle crash while he was carrying out routine maintenance duties on the highway, the kind of roadside work that CTDOT crews perform every day across the state.

Hernandez had worked for CTDOT since 2010, a tenure of roughly sixteen years, and was based out of the agency's garage in Stratford. Colleagues and officials described him as a dedicated longtime employee who, like thousands of other CTDOT highway workers, spent his career exposed to fast moving traffic while maintaining the state's roads. Beyond his years of service and his work base, few personal details about his family, education or life outside the job have been made public as of this writing.

His death mattered immediately as a public safety story as much as a personal tragedy. CTDOT Commissioner Garrett Eucalitto and other officials used the moment to renew warnings about the dangers highway and roadside workers face from passing motorists, describing driver disregard for work zones as a persistent and serious problem. Governor Ned Lamont and Lieutenant Governor Susan Bysiewicz both issued statements mourning Hernandez and calling his death a heartbreaking tragedy that underscored the risks CTDOT's roughly 3,300 employees take on every time they step onto the highway.

Hernandez died on Interstate 95 south in Fairfield after a three vehicle crash closed the highway. Governor Lamont's office said flags across Connecticut would be lowered to half staff to coincide with the date of his funeral, though funeral arrangements had not been finalized at the time of his death. The cause of the crash and any charges against a driver had not been confirmed in initial reporting.

Hernandez's death prompted an outpouring of grief from state leaders, coworkers and the broader CTDOT workforce, who called it a senseless loss and renewed pleas for drivers to slow down and move over in highway work zones. He is remembered as a public servant who lost his life doing the ordinary, necessary work of keeping Connecticut's roads safe for others.