Two Vicksburg men were injured when the vehicle in which members of their rock band were traveling was “picked up” by Saturday’s tornadoes and flipped several times along Interstate 55 about 45 miles north of Jackson.

Nate Wright and Devon Cessian of Vicksburg were treated for lacerations to their faces, said another Vicksburg resident, Dustin Thomas.

All three are members of Burning Windsor, which was on its way to Memphis for an engagement Saturday night at New Daisy Theater.

“Out of nowhere, it hit. It was a blanket of rain,” said Thomas, who was not injured.

“All I remember is that we rolled two to four times and we skidded across about 30 or 40 yards. Trees started snapping and flying. It lasted about a minute, but it seemed longer.”

He said eight others vehicles were tossed by the twister that left them all in the median of the north-south highway

“We were caught in the middle of an F-4 tornado five minutes out of Durant,” Thomas said. “We were at a standstill,” Thomas said. “It blew out our windows. Our windshield busted. We lost everything, all of our equipment… but everyone is alive.”

Cessian was treated and released from University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson, and Wright was treated and released from a hospital in Winona, Thomas said.

“We had listened to the radio and had talked to people about the tornado,” he said, “but we thought it was going to pass, and all we would get was rain.”

The band members were traveling in a 1982 Jeep Cherokee and pulling a trailer that contained their musical equipment. Thomas said the vehicle’s structure probably saved their lives.

“It’s strange,” Thomas said, “but I’ve always wanted to see a tornado.”

Another band member, Vicksburg Post photo chief Meredith Spencer, who was in Oxford when the storm hit, went to the scene, and the band continued onto Memphis, where they expected to go on with their show, Spencer said.

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Contact Manivanh Chanprasith at mchan@vicksburgpost.com