At 3:13 a.m. on the first day of the new year, Alexis Scott-Windham laughed in a video on Bourbon Street with friends while holding a New Orleans signature cocktail.
“I was having a blast,” Alexis, 23, told CNN.
Just minutes later, the whole night would change.
As Alexis’ group debated where to get a late-night snack to end their night out, a man from Texas drove a 6,000-pound pickup truck into a crowd on Bourbon Street, firing a weapon and running into Alexis and her friend Brandon Whitsett.
The FBI confirmed Thursday 14 people were killed and dozens injured in the terror attack.
Before the night took a tragic turn, Alexis described a hopeful New Year’s celebration with new friends and old.
She drove from Mobile, Alabama, with seven friends, including Brandon, to New Orleans on New Year’s Eve.
The area surrounding Bourbon Street was packed, Alexis said, making it difficult to even find a parking spot.
They bought some infamous New Orleans Hand Grenade cocktails.
They ended up meeting some other tourists, from Chicago and their Alabama hometown, bonding with them while drinking cocktails.
At midnight, she remembers being in the middle of Bourbon Street with her new Chicago friends and taking a selfie while laughing.
“Everybody was just telling each other Happy New Year. It was a great vibe … everybody was dancing,” said Alexis. “I was just happy to be with my friends and ring in 2025. It started out so good.”
At one point, someone threw $20 bills from a balcony, which Alexis and her friends tried to grab.
After the ball dropped, her group stayed mostly outside on Bourbon Street rather than in the bars, because they could still hear the music.
“People would dance in the street,” said Alexis. “Everyone was throwing beads and stuff, just having a good time.”
Around 2:40 a.m., they decided to try to get some food and head home. They first went to a pizza place but it was closed, so they were debating going to a Waffle House.
That’s when they suddenly heard a loud noise go “Boom, Boom, Boom,” according to Alexis.
“As we look to our left, we see the truck come down the sidewalk because he was halfway on the sidewalk and halfway on the street. As he’s coming down, he has no lights on,” said Alexis. “He was hitting people like speed bumps, like we were nothing.”
At first, she thought he was a drunken driver, but then quickly realized he was intentionally trying to hit people.
As she tried to jump out of the way, the front of his truck hit the back of her leg. She thought it broke her ankle.
Then she saw the bodies in the street.
“When I got up, I saw a man and he was dead. He was just leaking blood … They were trying to help him but he was already gone. There was a man on the other side of me too. He was on the ground facedown and he wasn’t even moving.”
As she started to look around to process what was happening, she realized she couldn’t get up and walk on her own, because her foot was bleeding so much.
“I’m trying to get up. I’m trying to get out of there. I made it this far, I’m trying to survive and make it home,” said Alexis, recalling she started to panic.
Just then, one of her friends in the group found her and helped carry her to a side street away from Bourbon Street, worried it wasn’t safe on the main street.
Her friend looked at her and said, “Lex, I think you got shot.” She hadn’t even realized at first, saying the whole incident happened “like a snap of a finger.”
Thinking back, she believes the driver shot at her from the truck while she was falling.
Her other friends regrouped on the side street but no one could find their friend Brandon, who was standing right next to Alexis before the truck plowed through the street. She started crying out of fear for Brandon, whom she said is like a brother to her.
A police officer nearby found Alexis and tried to get her an EMT, she said, while her friends went to search for Brandon. She thought the EMTs were focused on people with more severe injuries, so it was taking too long.
“By that time, I was already in pain. I was shivering, I was cold, I was crying, like I need to get out of here right now,” she said.
A good Samaritan who walked by offered to take her to the hospital. Alexis was dubious because she didn’t know him.
“But time was ticking and I was hurting, so I was like, ‘just get me there,’” Alexis said. “He was like, ‘I’m going to get you there.’”
Her friends were unable to find Brandon, causing more anxiety for the group. It turned out he had been rushed to a hospital.
Alexis was able to speak to him by phone Thursday night but said he was having difficultly talking because he is still in so much pain. She has faith he’ll make it out of this but said his legs, shoulders and back are “really messed up.”
After surviving a traumatic night, Alexis doesn’t want to live in fear and importantly, she doesn’t want other young people to be afraid of experiencing the world and having fun either. Instead, she thinks people should be alert and aware of their surroundings.
She also feels surviving such a tragic incident has made her feel stronger and people are looking up to her, including her one-year-old daughter.
“When my daughter grows, she’s going to have to see it and she’s going to see her mama was strong and made it through the situation,” Alexis said.
