Tracy Morgan detailed the 2014 limousine crash after being hit by a Walmart truck on the New Jersey Turnpike, recalling his friend Ardie Fuqua’s 20-day coma and the death of James McNair. In a conversation released June 10, he also discussed his own 10-day med
Tracy Morgan remembers the moment the limousine was struck—and he’s telling it without softening the facts.
In a conversation released Wednesday, June 10, on Saturday Night Live’s Marcello Hernández for Variety & CNN’s Actors on Actors episode, Morgan, 57, revisited a 2014 crash that left him and friends fighting for their lives after they were hit by a Walmart truck.
Morgan said he was riding in a limousine with Ardie Fuqua and James McNair—also known by the stage name Jimmy Mack—down the New Jersey Turnpike after finishing a comedy show. He described the impact in blunt. specific terms: “That truck was doing 70 miles per hour with 85. 000 pounds of frozen food in the back.”.
Then he turned to what happened to his friend Jimmy Mack. “My friend Jimmy Mack — God bless — his neck was broke so bad his face was on his back,” Morgan recalled.
The crash has stayed with Morgan, even as his life moved forward. The episode’s discussion reached Fuqua, who was one of Morgan’s longtime friends, and who also endured the wreck. Morgan said Fuqua was in a coma for 20 days. “That’s my guy. He was in the accident with me. He was in a coma for 20 days,” he said. “I was in it for 10 days.”.
Hernández, 28, responded with relief that Morgan survived, telling him, “I speak for all of us when I say we are so happy and so blessed that you’re here, man.”
Morgan answered with gratitude, adding that his recovery included a level of care that reached beyond friends and family. He said Saturday Night Live boss Lorne Michaels reached out to Morgan’s ex-wife. Sabina. repeatedly to check on him after the crash. Morgan said he and Sabrina were high school sweethearts who married from 1987 to 2009. and that Sabrina died in 2016 after a battle with cancer.
“Lorne must have called my ex-wife about a thousand times to see if I was out the coma,” Morgan recalled.
Morgan’s injuries were severe and wide-ranging. He said he was placed in a medically induced coma. and that he sustained multiple injuries including a shattered femur. a broken nose. a traumatic brain injury. and several broken ribs. After he woke. Morgan described months of physical therapy and rehabilitation as he had to learn how to walk and talk again.
The same episode also addressed what came after the crash in court. The truck driver pleaded not guilty to criminal charges. The investigation conducted by the National Transportation Safety Board found that the driver had been on the road for 13 and a half hours. while the legal limit for a truck driver’s work day is 14 hours.
Morgan eventually sued Walmart for negligence. In 2015, he said the parties settled the lawsuit for an undisclosed amount, and he hinted on Wednesday that the outcome was substantial.
“You know why we do comedy?. Necessity. But once you make it, then you surround yourself with people that need to do this as a necessity. You might not have no bills to pay, because you made it. But they got bills to pay, so they got to be funny,” Morgan said. “I got hit by a Walmart truck, so with the money I got, I don’t need to do this. But I surround myself with people that need to do this and love it.”.
Tracy Morgan Walmart truck crash Marcello Hernández Actors on Actors Saturday Night Live Ardie Fuqua James McNair Jimmy Mack Lorne Michaels Sabina Morgan National Transportation Safety Board lawsuit settlement 2015