freenode News Thursday 16 September 2006 at 10:58:00:

On the 12th September Rob Levin, known to many as Freenode’s lilo, was hit by a car while riding his bike. He suffered head injuries and was in a coma. Rob was being treated at the Neuro Trauma Intensive Care Unit at a local hospital in Houston, Texas where he passed away in on Sept 16th.

Our thoughts are with Rob and his family, and we ask that you respect their privacy during this difficult time.

Condolences can be sent to condolences AT freenode.net

On behalf of freenode Staff and the PDPC Board, Christel Dahlskjaer, Mike Mattice and Phil Stracchino.

For many years, ibiblio hosted the FreeNode pages. Any time we were off the net between here and Houston, we could be sure that we’d be hearing from Rob. He was completely dedicated to keeping communications amongst Free Software developers open and available. His death at age 50 is untimely and saddening.

From Laughing Squid:

UPDATE: A quiet channel as been setup at #lilo-memorial for reverent idling and #lilo-mourning for discussion.

Slashdot story and comments here.