NASHVILLE, Tenn. – As daylight broke across the greater Nashville area Tuesday, the devastation from a tornado that tore through parts of the city under the cover of darkness was revealed. At an airport, small jets were tossed. Power lines were down. Dozens of buildings had collapsed.
The death toll jumped to at least 22 people after tornadoes ripped across central Tennessee. As a result of the disaster, police and fire crews spent hours pulling survivors and bodies from wrecked buildings, Fox News reported.
“Last night was a reminder about how fragile life is,” Nashville Mayor John Cooper told reporters at a news conference Tuesday morning.
John C. Tune Airport, Nashville International’s sister airport in West Nashville, “sustained significant damage due to severe weather,” spokeswoman Kym Gerlock said in a statement early Tuesday.
Country star Dierks Bentley said he narrowly missed the tornado in Nashville as he flew into John C. Tune Monday night. He tweeted that he landed at the airport around 11:30 p.m.
We ducked around this cell and landed at john tune airport around 11:30 last night. Glad we landed when we did. Wouldn’t have been good an hour later. It was the cell that turned into the tornado. Lot of people lost their homes. No one comes together as a city like Nashville does pic.twitter.com/qvCjrYNu0x
— Dierks Bentley (@DierksBentley) March 3, 2020
“Glad we landed when we did. Wouldn’t have been good an hour later,” Bentley tweeted. “It was the cell that turned into the tornado.”
In addition to devastation at the airport, fallen walls and roofs, snapped power lines and huge broken trees left city streets in gridlock.
Search-and-rescue crews fanned out into neighborhoods searching for injured people in collapsed structures.
The tornado that struck Nashville’s “heavily populated area was estimated EF-3, which means wind between 136 and 165 mph.
The Tennessee Department of Correction also shared photos of the damage to the historic Tennessee State Prison.
TDOC has also been affected by the overnight Tornado in middle Tennessee. These are photos of the damage from the site of the historic Tennessee State Prison. pic.twitter.com/Hs5NwmjvyV
— Dept of Correction (@TNTDOC1) March 3, 2020
“It is heartbreaking,” said Gov. Bill Lee. “We have had loss of life all across the state.”
President Trump said he’d visit the area Friday. “We send our love and our prayers of the nation to every family that was affected,” he said. “We will get there, and we will recover, and we will rebuild, and we will help them.”
