We consider the fractional Cox-Ingersoll-Ross process satisfying the stochastic differential equation (SDE) dXt = aXt dt + σ √ Xt dB H t driven by a fractional Brownian motion (fBm) with Hurst parameter exceeding 2 3 . The integral t 0 √ XsdB H s is considered as a pathwise integral and is equal to the limit of Riemann-Stieltjes integral sums. It is shown that the fractional Cox-Ingersoll-Ross process is a square of the fractional Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process until the first zero hitting. Based on that, we consider the square of the fractional Ornstein-Uhlenbeck process with an arbitrary Hurst index and prove that until its first zero hitting it satisfies the specified SDE if the integral t 0 √Xs dB H s is defined as a pathwise Stratonovich integral. Therefore, the question about the first zero hitting time of the Cox -Ingersoll -Ross process, which matches the first zero hitting moment of the fractional Ornstein -Uhlenbeck process, is natural. Since the latter is a Gaussian process, it is proved by the estimates for distributions of Gaussian processes that for a < 0 the probability of hitting zero in finite time is equal to 1, and in case of a > 0 it is positive but less than 1. The upper bound for this probability is given.