KEY BISCAYNE, Fla. – New details are emerging about the bicyclist who died Sunday morning after being struck by a Miami-Dade County police vehicle.
57-year-old Hector Echeverria was a beloved member of the Key Biscayne community.
His son Joseph described him as a loving dad, an ironman triathlete and avid cyclist.
Echeverria was killed Sunday morning in a collision involving a Miami-Dade police officer that also hurt another cyclist. It happened just after 7 a.m. near Virginia Key Beach.
"The officer was quite visibly shaken up," Miami-Dade Police Det. Angel Rodriguez said Sunday.
Miami-Dade police have not identified that officer as of Wednesday.
In an email update, police said the officer’s name is unavailable. The department said the officer was driving on Arthur Lamb Jr. Road when “the two cyclists were struck.” It did not say how the collision may have happened.
Authorities said a traffic homicide investigation is ongoing.
"The officer involved in this incident is assigned here and regularly patrols the causeway and the surrounding areas," Rodriguez said Sunday.
Echeverria’s son Joseph spoke with Local 10 by phone Wednesday and said the family became worried Sunday night when no one had heard from him.
He says it wasn’t until Tuesday he learned about his father’s death by going to the police department in person.
Miami-Dade police told Local 10 they initially struggled to identify Echeverria. It’s not clear who in the family was notified.
Joseph says his father worked as a math teacher at Mast Academy in Key Biscayne and had recently battled and overcome pancreatic cancer. becoming cancer-free just six months ago.
For family, that makes losing him like this, doing something he loved, even harder to accept.