A 3-year-old boy was clinging to life after being struck by a car in north Cape Coral on Tuesday.

The child, whose name was not released by police, was airlifted to Lee Memorial Hospital in a critical, unresponsive state, said city spokesperson Connie Barron. He was later med-flighted to St. Petersburg All Children’s Hospital with multiple serious injures.

The driver believed to have hit the child near the intersection of Kismet Parkway and Del Prado Boulevard left the scene and was later detained in North Fort Myers for questioning, Barron said.

Police described him as an older, heavyset man with a white beard and wire-rimmed glasses, who possibly visits the area often and does construction work. He was driving a late ’80s Chrysler New Yorker that is brown or maroon in color and is missing the front driver’s side hubcap.

Barron said the man had not been charged Tuesday afternoon and his identity would not be released pending the investigation.

The 3-year-old was pulled in a wagon by his aunt as the two left the nearby Publix shopping plaza, Barron said. They were headed south on the west side of Del Prado Boulevard when bridge construction workers told them they could not go through.

As his aunt spoke with construction workers, the child jumped out of the wagon and ran across Del Prado into the path of a vehicle in the outside northbound lane, officials reported.

It is unclear how quickly the vehicle was traveling.

“It’s very, very sad,” Barron said.

Police temporarily diverted northbound traffic Tuesday afternoon as they conducted a crime scene investigation.