Albany student from Long Island in coma after dirt bike hit-and-run

Alexa Kropf was supposed to be heading back home to Long Island in the coming days for summer break.

Instead, the University at Albany freshman is fighting for her life inside an Albany hospital after a dirt bike rider smashed into her over the weekend and kept going.

The Floral Park 19-year-old was struck about 12:30 a.m. Saturday in the Pine Hills section of the city, which is known for its bustling social scene. Hospitalized in critical condition, she suffered a brain injury and multiple fractures to her leg, pelvis and ribs.

Albany Medical Center Hospital physicians performed multiple surgeries to remove blood and fluid from around her brain and to set her broken bones, and she has been placed in a medically induced coma.

“She was supposed to come home next week from her first year of college but she’s not coming home, not yet anyway,” Alexa Kropf’s father Jim told CBS6 Albany earlier today, choking back tears. “She has a tremendously long road ahead of her.

Referring to the moment he learned of the hit-and-run and his daughter’s condition, he said. “It’s a phone call that no parent would ever want to receive.”

Kropf was struck by a male riding a dirt bike on Hudson Avenue who had been weaving through groups when he collided into her, according to multiple reports. Jim Kropf described his daughter as the kind of “fun-loving … a person that everyone wants to be around.”

Donations to help Kropf’s family with medical bills and to compensate for her parents missing time at work have poured into a GoFundMe effort established by a family friend. Nearly $62,000 had been raised as of Tuesday afternoon, from over 1,100 donations.

“The outpouring of support has been beyond overwhelming for us,” Jim Kropf told CBS6 Albany. “She’s surrounded by fantastic people, and we’ll continue to by her side until she makes it through.”

Jim Kropf has a message for the ATV operator hit his child.

“If he has any sense of decency as a human being, he would step forward and turn himself in,” he said.

_{Top photo: Alexa Kropf (GoFundMe)}