Similar salt truck involved in the accident on Thursday morning… Photo by Barry West

According to the Tennessee Highway Patrol, two Tennessee Department of Transportation salt trucks where spreading salt on I-24 eastbound at the 105 mile marker on Thursday morning around 4:35am. As they were attempting to clear snow and ice from I-24 a tractor-trailer was traveling in the left lane of I-24 behind one of the TDOT vehicles. The driver of the 18-wheeler, 24 year-old Jonathan White from Swainsboro, Ga. merged into the right lane attempting to pass the TDOT vehicle which was in the left lane. It was at this time the tractor-trailer crashed into the rear of one of the salt trucks driven by 53 year-old Steven Gowen of Manchester, TN which was in the right lane of I-24. The TDOT truck was struck so hard by the 18-wheeler that it was knocked over onto its side.
Gowen, White and a passenger in the tractor-trailer were taken by Coffee County EMS with unknown injuries to Medical Center of Manchester.

One out of three students who applied for free community college through Tennessee Promise are no longer eligible because of a problem with their applications.
According to WPLN, a third of students did not complete the mandatory steps to get the scholarship.
Another 11 percent of students did not apply for federal aid, which is mandatory to get any scholarship.
The state had posted reminders online, in schools and on social media to remind students to complete the necessary steps.
Tennessee Promise allows every Tennessee high school graduate to receive two years of free community college.

A group of Tennessee college students wants a federal court to require the state to accept their school identification cards as valid voter identification. The out-of-state students attending Fisk University and Tennessee State University say in the lawsuit filed on Wednesday they would like to vote in Tennessee, but they lack proper ID. Tennessee will not accept identification cards from other states, nor will the state accept student ID cards from Tennessee colleges and universities. The students say the law is unconstitutional. They note Tennessee does accept college and university ID cards issued by the state to workers, just not to students.

After nearly 70 years in Chattanooga’s Highland Park, Tennessee Temple University is closing its doors. University board members voted unanimously Tuesday to move campuses and merge with Piedmont International University, a private Christian college in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The merger will be finalized April 30th, giving students, faculty and staff a few months to decide on what to do next. The roughly 700 students (265 on-campus and the rest online students) now have a few options. They can move with the school to PIU with the promise that no student will have to pay any more in tuition than they already are. But not all TTU majors will be offered at Piedmont, and not all student-athletes will be able to continue their sport. They only offer men’s basketball and women’s volleyball. Two former Coffee County High School students play baseball for Tennessee Temple, John Reese Gilmer and Tyler Cavender. Students have the option to stay local and finish their degrees at Shorter University in Rome, GA or Bryan College in Dayton, TN and promises an unaffected graduation date if relocated.” New plans for the TTU campus space have already been finalized. All buildings were sold to the ministry organization Redemption to the Nations, with plans to establish a Bible college next year.