Stevie Dacanay has described what he saw from Buckcherry‘s tour bus on Interstate 26 in South Carolina last month, in the first extended account any member of the band has given.
The guitarist, who performs as Stevie D., spoke to Shawn Ratches on “Laughing Monkey” about the pile-up on August 21 in Spartanburg County, in which a man was killed.
“I haven’t really even talked about it with anybody outside the band. But, yeah, there was an accident just outside of… We were coming out of a show in South Carolina, and there was an accident right bef[ore]… We were all all coming over a hill. And there was a drunk guy that pulled over. He was half in the shoulder, half in the right lane, opened his door, walked out of his car, and the first car hit him. And then he flew into the left lane, and then we came over the hill, took off his door and then the door went into oncoming traffic and caused a pile-up over there, and then we hit the guy after that. Then several cars — I think five or six more cars — came over the hill after us, and there was a pile-up after us. So there was quite a mess. After we pulled over, a drum tech ran about a quarter of a mile down to see what had happened and saw the aftermath. And our bus was not drivable after that. There was gas, there was diesel and transmission fluid and brake fluid on the highway, and then they closed it all down because the guy had passed. And so we were all there on the highway till about 8:00 a.m. And it happened around 2:00 a.m. But that was that in a nutshell,” he said (as transcribed by Blabbermouth).
The South Carolina Highway Patrol’s account of the sequence differs in one substantial respect.
Master Trooper Mitch Ridgeway said the incident began when a vehicle struck a guardrail. The driver got out and was then hit by two vehicles. A Toyota sedan travelling east at mile marker 31 struck him and he was pronounced dead at the scene.
On the tour bus specifically, Ridgeway told that Buckcherry‘s vehicle did not hit the man, but ran over debris from the collisions. That matches what the band themselves said at the time: their statement described “the collision that occurred ahead of our bus”, and a representative subsequently clarified that the fatal crash had happened before the bus reached the scene.
Dacanay‘s recollection, that the bus struck the man after taking off the car door, does not align with either. He gave the account three weeks after the event and prefaced it by saying he had barely discussed it outside the band.
His description of the driver as intoxicated is also his own. No official finding to that effect has been reported, and the Highway Patrol’s statements make no reference to alcohol.
Dacanay was critical of how the crash was reported, and of material that circulated online afterwards.
“I saw that there was a bunch of press after that…,” he recalled. “I guess what a lot of outlets do is kind of spin it in a way where people will click on it. And it looked like somebody in our camp had died… I don’t know. There was just a bunch of… It was just a weird spin on things. And then there was even… I saw podcasts about the accident, that they were speculating things, and it was just really silly. So, I just stayed out of the whole thing. It was a traumatic kind of thing… I even saw a story — it was on YouTube. It came up in my feed. I, just like everyone else, clicked on it, and it was all this footage of crashes that weren’t even our accident. And they were horrifying. And then peppered with pictures of us. So, I don’t know. It is what it is. It’s over. And I hope that guy is in a — he’s obviously in a better place now.”
Buckcherry had played The Orange Peel in Asheville on August 20 and were driving south towards Florida when the crashes happened at around 2am. Debris closed the eastbound carriageway between exits 28 and 35, and all lanes reopened around 10.30am.
Every member of the band and the touring crew was unharmed, as was the bus driver. The identity of the man who died has not been made public.
The band’s statement at the time read: “At approximately 2:00 AM Friday morning, Buckcherry’s tour bus was involved in a multi-vehicle accident on I-26 in Spartanburg County, South Carolina.”
“We are extremely grateful to report that all members of Buckcherry and our touring crew are safe and unharmed.”
“Tragically, authorities have confirmed that the collision that occurred ahead of our bus resulted in a fatality. Our thoughts and deepest condolences are with the family and loved ones of the person who lost their life.”
“Buckcherry’s scheduled performance tomorrow at the Culture Room in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, is expected to proceed as planned.”
“We sincerely appreciate everyone who has reached out with concern and support.”
Buckcherry are touring Roar Like Thunder, their eleventh album, released in June 2025 through Round Hill Records in North America, Sony Music in Japan and Earache elsewhere. Like 2023’s Vol. 10 and 2021’s Hellbound, it was made at Sienna Studios in Nashville with producer Marti Frederiksen, whose credits include Aerosmith and Def Leppard. All ten songs were written by Josh Todd, Dacanay and Frederiksen.
Todd is the band’s only remaining original member. The lineup is completed by Dacanay and Billy Rowe on guitar, Kelly LeMieux on bass and Francis Ruiz on drums.
