NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — Second Avenue is almost completely rebuilt from the Christmas day bombing in 2020, but for many Nashvillians what happened in New Orleans is reminiscent of what happened here.
“I think about the way I was woken up with that news on Christmas Day a few years ago and the same sort of just trying to get through the fog of sleep and trying to find out what happened,” said Tommy Crouse, News Channel 5 Media Content manager.
Crouse touches nearly every story that comes into the newsroom.
But this New Year's Eve, he was taking some much-deserved time off in New Orleans.
“My sister was tapping on her door and said our mother was freaking out because she hadn’t heard from any of us,” said Crouse. “We were in town to get married. We had some family in early for New Year’s Eve and went down to the French Quarter for dinner.”
Sitting on a porch in New Orleans' Garden District with his son napping in his lap, Tommy told me how they went down to Bourbon Street to ring in the New Year.
They left only hours before a truck drove into a crowd.
“It’s been tough to digest the scope of the tragedy. I think that’s always the part that’s hardest to get your head around that that many people are gone through one person‘s active viciousness,” said Tommy.
“It’s tense obviously a lot of people are concerned.”
He's now miles away from the terror investigation on Bourbon Street, mourning for those families who have lost and thankful to hug his loved ones.