HILO, Hawaiʻi — Christmas Eve is supposed to arrive gently, carrying light, forgiveness, and the promise of togetherness.
It is meant to be a pause in the year, a night when families breathe a little easier and the world softens its edges.

But on December 24, along the dark stretch of Daniel K. Inouye Highway, that promise shattered in an instant.

Just after 7:28 p.m., a Toyota Tacoma traveling Hilo-bound crossed over the center line.

The truck struck a Mazda head-on, a violent collision between two vehicles moving in opposite directions under a night sky that offered no warning.
In that single moment, lives diverged forever.

First responders arrived to a scene that already felt final.
The driver of the Mazda was unresponsive, her injuries grave enough that silence replaced urgency.
She was rushed to Hilo Benioff Medical Center, the very place where she had spent years saving others.

At 7:59 p.m., she was pronounced dead.
The woman whose hands had steadied countless emergencies did not survive the one she never saw coming.
Her name was Judy Fitzgerald.

The loss landed like a wave across Hilo.
Not loud at first, not dramatic, but heavy, sinking into the community with the slow realization of who had been taken.
A doctor, a leader, a colleague, a friend.

Later Thursday afternoon, Hilo Benioff Medical Center confirmed what many already feared.
In a social media post, the hospital shared a statement filled with grief and disbelief.
It was not just an announcement, but a collective heartbreak made public.

“It is with profound sadness that we share the passing of Dr. Judy Fitzgerald,” the statement read.
“She was involved in a tragic motor vehicle accident last night that was not survivable.”

Words chosen carefully, yet powerless to soften the truth they carried.

Dr. Kathleen Katt, Chief Medical Officer and longtime Emergency Department colleague, spoke not only as a leader but as a friend.

“She is an Emergency physician colleague of mine and most importantly a dear, irreplaceable friend,” Dr. Katt said.
In that sentence, professional loss and personal grief collided.

Dr. Fitzgerald was not simply part of the Emergency Department.

She was woven into it, a constant presence in moments when lives hung in the balance.
She knew the rhythm of crisis, the language of urgency, and the calm required when everything else was falling apart.

For years, she served as both physician and leader.
She was integral to Emergency Department and Urgent Care teams, shaping not just outcomes, but culture.
Her influence extended beyond the walls of the hospital and into the region through ACLS training.

Advanced Cardiac Life Support is not glamorous work.
It is repetitive, technical, demanding, and essential when seconds decide outcomes.
Dr. Fitzgerald took that responsibility seriously, helping ensure that others were ready when hearts stopped beating.

Colleagues describe her as steady.
Not flashy, not loud, but reliable in the way that matters most during emergencies.
The kind of doctor you wanted beside you when the room went quiet and the monitors told a dangerous story.

Her death left an absence that cannot be filled by staffing schedules or administrative adjustments.
Because hospitals do not just lose employees when someone like Dr. Fitzgerald dies.
They lose institutional memory, mentorship, and trust built over years.

HBMC CEO Dan Brinkman spoke plainly.
“One of our HBMC family has passed,” he said.
“She will be missed.”

That simplicity carried weight.
It reflected the reality that no polished statement could capture the magnitude of the loss.

Some grief is too immediate, too raw, for elaborate language.

The shock extended beyond the hospital.
Hawaiʻi County Mayor Kimo Alameda spoke openly about the emotional toll on the island.

“It’s hard to put into words,” he said, “it’s all emotions right now.”

His voice reflected a community already carrying sorrow.
The island was still processing the passing of Fire Chief Todd, another leader gone too soon.

And now, another pillar had fallen.

“This doctor was very special to us,” Mayor Alameda said.
“She was a first responder in her own way and a leader in the health field on our island.”

His words acknowledged a truth often overlooked.

Emergency physicians are first responders, even if they do not arrive in sirens.
They receive the aftermath of every disaster, every crash, every call that went wrong.

They absorb trauma so others can survive it.

Dr. Fitzgerald spent her career standing on the far side of accidents like the one that took her life.
She treated victims of impaired driving, reckless speeds, and sudden violence.
She bore witness to consequences most people only imagine.

That irony is difficult to accept.
That someone so devoted to saving lives would be taken by an act she had likely warned others about countless times.
It adds a layer of pain that logic cannot resolve.

According to police, the driver of the Toyota Tacoma was a 34-year-old woman.
She sustained minor injuries and was taken to Hilo Benioff Medical Center for treatment.
The same hospital where Dr. Fitzgerald worked, and where she died.

After her release from the hospital, the driver was arrested.
She faces charges including first-degree negligent homicide, operating a vehicle under the influence of an intoxicant, and reckless driving.
The weight of those charges reflects the severity of what occurred.

Court documents reveal a troubling pattern.
The driver reportedly had multiple prior speeding citations.
Including one instance of traveling 95 miles per hour in a 55 mile per hour zone.

Patterns like these often feel invisible until tragedy forces them into view.
Speeding tickets become footnotes, warnings dismissed as inconveniences rather than alarms.
Until the moment arrives when there is no rewind.

The investigation remains ongoing.
Officials continue to piece together the timeline, the decisions, and the conditions that led to the crash.
But no investigation can answer the question most people are asking.

Why does it take loss for recklessness to be taken seriously.
Why warnings so often go unheeded until someone irreplaceable is gone.
Why accountability arrives only after devastation.

For Dr. Fitzgerald’s family, these questions may offer no comfort.
Their grief is not academic or procedural.
It is personal, intimate, and permanent.

They lost a daughter, a sister, a loved one.
A person whose professional identity cannot fully explain who she was at home.
The public may know her as “doctor,” but her family knew her as more.

For her colleagues, the Emergency Department will feel different.
The empty space where her voice used to be will echo during long shifts.
Every familiar routine will carry reminders of her absence.

Patients who never knew her name still felt her impact.
Lives stabilized, hearts restarted, crises navigated because she was there.
Her legacy lives quietly in people who walked out of the hospital alive.

Christmas Eve will never feel the same for those who worked that night.
The date will forever carry a second meaning, heavier than celebration.
A reminder that joy and grief often share the same calendar.

Communities often struggle to know how to mourn professionals.
There is gratitude mixed with distance, respect layered with unfamiliarity.
But this loss feels closer, sharper.

Because emergency doctors are witnesses to our worst moments.
They see us broken, terrified, and desperate.
And they help us anyway.

Dr. Fitzgerald did that work without expectation of recognition.
She showed up for nights, holidays, and crises others hoped never to see.
She carried the responsibility quietly.

Now the community carries her memory.
In hospital halls, in training rooms, in conversations that begin with “Do you remember when Judy…”
In the unspoken understanding that something precious was lost.

There will be court proceedings.
There will be legal arguments, evidence, and sentencing discussions.
But justice, whatever form it takes, will not restore what was taken.

It will not bring back a physician whose hands steadied countless emergencies.
It will not undo the grief now woven into her family’s lives.
It will not erase the empty space left behind.

What remains is remembrance.
A commitment to speak her name with respect.
A resolve to let her story matter beyond the headlines.

And perhaps, if the community is willing, a reckoning with choices that feel small until they are fatal.
Speeding, impairment, recklessness treated as personal risks rather than public dangers.
Warnings ignored until lives are lost.

Dr. Judy Fitzgerald’s life was defined by service.
Her death should serve as a reminder of responsibility.
To drive with care, to take warnings seriously, to protect life whenever possible.

Because somewhere tonight, another emergency physician is standing in a trauma bay.
Another doctor is fighting for a life injured on a roadway.
And the cycle continues.

But one chair will remain empty at Hilo Benioff Medical Center.
One voice will be missing from the team.
And a community will remember the doctor who never made it home on Christmas Eve.

May her memory be a blessing.
May her family find strength in the love surrounding them.
And may this loss not be in vain.