White Elephant in the Room Actually Tony Mercurio
Restaurant patrons at the Hooters on Military Highway in Norfolk were nearly trampled on Thursday during a chaotic scene. What was initially supposed to be a peaceful and fun live remote broadcast for ESPN 1310 AM from 3pm to 6pm turned ugly just minutes into the broadcast. Police first responded to calls of a large elephant babbling about uncontrollably inside of the restaurant at 3:13 p.m. Several witnesses say they were watching a baseball game between the Cubs and Brewers when they heard a loud commotion to their right. “We heard a noise that sounded like a suffocating moose, and saw the large white elephant emerge and grab a microphone”, said Terrell Levons of Norfolk. “Everybody got up and got the hell out of there!”.
The ESPN 1310 broadcast went on uninterrupted throughout the chaos as The Tony Mercurio Show could be heard live broadcasting from the location. Mercurio did make one mention of the restaurant patrons’ fleeing, asking “where everybody is going?”. Members of the Norfolk Fire Department and Norfolk Animal Control were both called into Hooters, but quickly identified that the large white elephant in the room was actually just local radio personality Tony Mercurio. Officials and restaurant management then began to encourage customers to come back in and enjoy their meals, assuring them that things were safe. Mercurio then finished up his broadcast (on the MLB trade deadline day) by talking about the upcoming Lady Monarchs basketball season for 2 hours and eating 79 chicken wings, 31 oysters and a key lime pie.
