This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2007, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
PRICE - They might have called on her cell phone, but Shelby Van Buren had her hands full giving her kids a bath. So she found out from a newscaster that her husband, Corey Van Buren, may have been caught in another collapse at the Crandall Canyon mine.
"I saw it on the TV. I had my babies in the tub. I just jumped," she said Thursday night, pacing and crying in front of the Castleview Hospital entrance, where a Price police officer had barred her way.
Van Buren's husband was the foreman of the crew caught in the cave-in. At the hospital, she learned more: the mine walls had fallen again. "They said the floor slipped, the floor popped," she said.
By the time the second ambulance arrived after the 6:30 p.m. disaster, the parking lot in front of the hospital emergency room and main entrance was jammed with cars and trucks. Men and women clutched cell phones to their ears and wandered aimlessly, looking as if they, too, had felt the concussion of the blasted mine ribs. Police officers stopped the people who approached, then checked a list to see if their names matched those of the hurt men inside.
Debbie Oveson's son, Adam Oveson, was with the crew. So were her nephews, Bodee and Benny Allred. Just the day before, Bodee Allred had spoken to reporters and the world about what they were doing to help find the six men trapped in the mine since Aug. 6.
Oveson got her call at work.
"They just told me to come to the hospital," she said as a police officer nudged her aside so he could hang yellow police barrier tape between her and the emergency room entrance.
Just after 7 p.m. at the Emery County sheriff's command post in Crandall Canyon, deputies suddenly told journalists to move their cameras and chairs. The deputies wouldn't say why, only that they were in a "fast" situation.
The first ambulance raced up to the mine at 7:10 p.m., a small white sedan right behind. A woman was driving. Sheriff's deputies, who had carefully checked everyone who went up that road for the past 11 days, didn't even blink.
A second ambulance sped past seven minutes later, again followed by a small sedan with women inside. No sirens signaled their approach up Highway 31. No sirens wailed when the first one went back down, as emergency medics stood inside over someone they worked to keep alive. They crossed paths with four more ambulances, and trucks and cars full of grim-faced men on their way up to help rescue their comrades.
Three men died, federal officials confirmed late Thursday. Six more lay injured at Castleview, Utah Valley Regional Medical Center and University Hospital. Helicopters touched down next to the Castleview emergency room doors, then flew away.
Debbie Oveson took heart from an event that took place just a week before the Aug. 6 mine collapse, when mine rescue teams from all over the nation held a competition at a Price canyon mine. Those are the men who were racing up the canyon, teams who have been hovering, waiting for the call.
"They were ready to go," Oveson said.