Nashville performer says twister aftermath ‘looked like a movie’

A Nashville entertainer says he slept through a deadly tornado that ripped through Tennessee on Monday night.

Buck McCoy was just two miles away from where the storm did its worst damage. When he woke up, he was confronted by a jarring scene.

“Within 11 minutes the whole scenery had been changed. Everything was just blown apart,” McCoy told the Greg Morgan Morning Show on Wednesday.

“In the morning, I went out there and it looked like a movie, like you were on the Universal Studios lot. It was just unreal how much damage was done in that amount of time.”

As of Wednesday morning, the death toll from the tornado was at 24, with dozens still missing.

Close to 50 building collapsed and about 150 people were hospitalized.

McCoy said the city is not unfamiliar with disaster and tragedy. In 2010, Nashville was hit by severe floods that killed at least 11 people.

He finds the destruction in this case to be even worse.

But if there was a heartening sight to be found, it was the community’s resilience.

“This is going to take the whole community coming together and it really brought me almost to an emotional state, to see there were little kids and families and they had their little gloves on. They were picking up little bricks and little things,” McCoy said.

“Everybody immediately started coming together. Strangers were pulling up to other people’s houses: ‘Everything OK? Can we get you some water? Can we get you some pizza?’ ”

In the days ahead, McCoy expects a few benefit concerts to be held.

“This going to be something that makes this city even stronger as we build it back together,” he said.