‘The Wire’ actor’s son turns 19 while recovering from tornado injury
ATLANTA, Ga. - The son of actor Tray Chaney celebrated his 19th birthday from the intensive-care unit where he’s recovering from injuries suffered in a tornado.
Tray Chaney, best known for playing Malik “Poot” Carr on HBO’s “The Wire,” said his son 18-year-old Malachai Chaney is in the intensive care unit with several broken ribs and a fractured bone in his face.
The family’s home is destroyed, but their son, Malachi Chaney, is making progress in his recovery.
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Malachi’s birthday was a tough day for family to be celebrating at Grady Hospital, but it was still a celebration. His father and HBO actor, Tray Chaney, said that Malachi is surrounded by family and he can feel the love, is awake, talking some more and even tried to sit up to hug his parents.
“Who would’ve thought your 19th birthday would be spent in ICU,” said Tray Chaney. “This amazing kid, young man was thrown as if on the football field 300 feet, and how is he still able to say, ‘I love you mom. I love you dad, it’s my birthday.’”
From his hospital bed, Malachi turned 19 years old on Sunday. The teen is recovering after being sucked out of his home and thrown nearly 300 feet when the tornado ripped a part his home on Thursday.
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Tray Chaney said Malachi has several broken ribs, and almost every bone in his face is fractured.
“We survived the battle, went to war with the tornado and came out living and breathing. So to survive that, but now to feel the pain that I feel as a father, as a man, as a husband who is the protector of my family, it’s tough,” said Tray. “We experience a lot of great things, but to experience something as tragic as this and for me to experience it with him, another form of the pain is me not being able to protect him in that moment.”
Tray was also home at the time of the twister. He is left with a cut on his forehead that knocked him out unconscious at the time.
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Tray said, “then to wake up underneath my house with bricks on my top of my back, nails a couple of inches from my head, dressers, I know who God is. I’m in the movie business, but I lived it. I lived a real-life movie story.”
The day after the tornado, the family had planned a surprise trip to D.C. for Malachi’s birthday. Instead, the family brought the celebration to him by decorating his hospital room.
“The Chaney family, my mom, dad, my mother-in-law, my daughter, my sisters, everybody is on planes, everybody is in cars, he’s covered, he’s really covered in love. Not only family, but around the world,” Tray Chaney said. “Our son, I want to see him walk and get up in hug and be not in pain. I want to see him be who he was, this young man is brilliant.
“He’s my hero, that’s how I can describe him.”
Tray said Malachi has a long road of recovery including therapies until “he is able to function on his own.” The father said there is no timelines for when his son will leave Grady, and that his son will be at Grady until he can function on his own.
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