Dispatchers honored for calm amid 2 major calls

PROVO — Provo dispatchers are being honored for their work juggling a train derailment and an imminent plane crash on the same day.

The Utah Association of Public Safety Communications Officials gave the city's dispatchers its incident of the year award for staying calm and collected while responding to the two major calls at once.

City officials say dispatchers got a report on May 1 that a train carrying three tankers of hazardous chemicals and a load of military vehicles had derailed.

In the middle of that response, they heard that a plane was about to crash. It eventually went down on the west side of Utah Lake and the two people inside were injured.

The award recognized the dispatchers for keeping cool and taking advantage of resources from other agencies.