Former Amazon CFO Joy Covey has reportedly died in a bicycle accident on Skyline Boulevard in San Mateo County.

CBS SF Bay Area reported that the accident occurred as the result of a collision with a white Mazda MPV minivan that turned in front of the bicycle, without naming the victim.

PandoDaily reports that people close to the Covey family confirmed that it was Joy, who is survived by her eight-year old son.

According to the CBS report, she had been wearing a helmet. The driver was a 22-year old male. Covey was 50.

Covey worked at Amazon from 1996 to 2000. She is credited with being instrumental in the company’s success in its early days. She was its first CFO, and was there when the company went public in 1997. More recently, Covey had reportedly been serving as treasurer of the National Resources Defense Council.

All Things D’s Kara Swisher fondly remembers interviewing her back in the mid-nineties before becoming good friends with her. Swisher writes:

Joy was tough, but fair, and she always had an interesting insight to the Internet scene, cutting right through the awful and endless logrolling and posturing in the tech world to get to the actual point. She was also a wonderful mother, and a good friend to many in the tech community, including myself.

Mostly, she was a person of substance, of heart, of grit and of much-needed humor. Joy did not just tell it like it was — she lived it like it was, too.

Swisher shares the old interview here.

Image: Joy Covey (Facebook)