Fayetteville coffee shop owner escapes deadly Tenn. tornadoes, plans to donate portion of sales to victims

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FAYETTEVILLE, N.C. (WTVD) — A Fayetteville coffee shop owner is looking to help victims of the deadly Tennessee tornadoes, after being in those very storms while visiting family over the weekend.

Molly Arnold spent Monday evening in downtown Nashville before the storms rolled through, only learning of the danger once she returned to her brother’s Nashville home.

RELATED: Nashville tornado: At least 24 dead as multiple tornadoes cause severe damage in Nashville, central Tennessee

The family turned on the TV and saw just how severe the weather was going to be, a tornado even touching down on the other side of the lake near where they were staying on early Tuesday morning.

“The rain and the lightning and everything started up real badly,” Arnold said.

The storms and tornadoes leveling homes and turning hundreds of lives upside down.

Arnold says her brother’s home and a loved one’s place in Cookeville County were spared, but that clearly wasn’t the case for everyone.

The longtime Fayetteville resident describing what she saw as she drove back to North Carolina on Tuesday, “Cookeville and Lebanon, you know, the power lines were all askew. The tractor-trailers, some of them were blown off the road and on their side”.

With dozens of lives lost in these storms and Arnold having a deep connection with the state, the owner of Rude Awakening Coffee House, in downtown Fayetteville, has decided to pitch in with the nationwide help efforts.

“We’re grateful that we came away unscathed and are lucky too, perhaps, help somebody in some small way,” Arnold said.

Arnold intends to donate a portion of their March sales to individual families in need.

At this moment, her friends and family in Tennessee are looking for victims of the storms who may need that money the most.

“I do think knowing someone else cares or other people care matters. It makes it a little easier to pick the pieces back up,” Arnold said.

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