Tennessee Family Missing Two Weeks Found Dead in Truck at Bottom of Ravine

Jeremy Cook, his fiancé Johanna Manor and her 8-year-old daughter Adalicia had not been seen since January 16. But last Wednesday, after a ten-day search, police finally located all three in their truck, at the bottom of a 100ft ravine.

Family members first became concerned when the parents failed to show up for work, and the little girl never arrived to school. They contacted police to perform a welfare check at the home on January 21, but officers could find no clues.

"No suspicions," Lt. Doddo of Hickman County Sheriff's Office told WKRN. "Nothing looked out of place, they end up leaving."

On January 23, Johanna's father finally filed a missing person's report; investigators began pulling bank records and checked license plate readers in multiple counties; they tried to ping their phones but were encountering difficulties.

"We had some misinformation about cell phone carriers which resulted in cell phones not being able to be pinged," Lt. Doddo said. "This wasn't a situation where we weren't trying to ping the phone, this was a situation where one phone carrier is not a major brand phone carrier. They don't have the resources that say AT&T, Verizon have."

On Wednesday, investigators were finally able to get a ping, from the 19th of January, which led them to a 1.9 mile radius area off Interstate 840.

"And we discovered a car about 30 yards to our left, kind of in a little bit of a ravine, which was hidden from sight," Doddo said.

According to Tennessee Highway Patrol, weather appears to have been the cause; they believe the truck struck a median concrete wall and toppled over it, falling 100ft and landing in thick undergrowth, where it remained hidden from view.

All three victims appeared to have died on impact.

"There's a very strong possibility that they either hydroplaned or, as we all know, bridges always freeze first," Lt. Doddo said. "They could have hit a patch of ice and went up over the railing."

In a bizarre twist, it emerged that a witness had seen the accident, and called 911 — but left the scene before police arrived to tell them what happened.

"This family would have been found a lot sooner had that person stuck around," Lt. Doddo told the outlet.

"Two troopers did respond there and they did not see anything. I can understand from the placement of the vehicle where the vehicle was why nobody would see the vehicle down there," he said. "You would either have to look under the bridge or lean over the side of the bridge and basically be underneath the bridge to see where they were. It was that difficult of a position to be seen from above. I don’t even think the helicopter would have seen them the way it was tucked up under the bridge.”

One resident who lives nearby confirmed there was no obvious evidence leading to the crash site.

"I was just down here yesterday and you cant see it, can't see it," he told the broadcaster. "How it got there is the question. How? There's no damage to the bridge."

"The family is devastated," Lt. Doddo added. "You've lost almost an entire generation in one crash, that's tragic in itself. This is just a tragic weather related accident."