At 9:15 AM on August 30, 2010, 62-year-old Kingsport resident Thomas Richard Cowan brought two loaded guns to the school and threatened then-principal Melanie Riden and school resource officer Carolyn Gudger, who escorted Riden to safety.

Cowan was shot by police officers and died at 10:10 AM.

[4] The school had athletic teams in all traditional varsity sports, including football, swimming, soccer, basketball, track, cross country, tennis, baseball, softball, volleyball, cheerleading, and marching band.

The heat to the Sullivan Central swimming pool went out in mid-December 2008 after the school's coal-fired hot-water boiler was replaced with three on-demand domestic water heaters that were unable to service the pool.

[5] The swim team practiced at sister school Sullivan North High School until it was reopened in January 2011, when the pool was dedicated to Bradley Brock, a senior who died of cancer in September 2010.