A 43-year-old man was hit and killed by a pickup truck on the Seward Highway in Midtown Anchorage on Thursday night.
At 5:06 p.m., the driver of the truck called 911 to report hitting a pedestrian near the Northern Lights Boulevard intersection, Anchorage Police Department spokeswoman Renee Oistad said.
"After reading the report, it looks to me like the pedestrian attempted to 'beat the light' and didn't make it," Oistad said Saturday. "According to witnesses, the man had just run northbound across Northern Lights. At this time, the light for northbound (Seward Highway) traffic had just turned from red to green. The driver of the pickup -- who hit the pedestrian -- proceeded through the intersection once they got a green light, crossed through the empty crosswalk, and then saw the pedestrian attempt to run across the (Seward Highway) westbound -- not in the crosswalk, but after it."
According to Oistad, the driver tried to stop in time, but couldn't. The pedestrian was taken to a hospital, where doctors declared him dead at 7:02 p.m.
Oistad wouldn't release the pedestrian's name pending confirmation of family notification.
The pickup truck driver was "very cooperative and was not at fault," Oistad said. She added that per police protocol, the driver was blood tested for drugs and alcohol, but neither were immediately suspected.
"So unless the blood test shows otherwise, the driver is not expected to be charged and/or cited with anything," she said.
Whether drugs or alcohol were a factor in the pedestrian's actions remains to be seen until tests are completed.