Lyndee Scott was making bookmarks with kids in the Wasatch County Library courtyard on Saturday morning as part of the library’s summer kickoff party when her 17-year-old daughter, Trinity, told her she’d seen a bottle with an attached note addressed to law enforcement close to a nearby bush. “I looked over, and there were police there. I was like, ‘That’s really weird.’ I didn’t think anything of it at first, but then, more and more police started coming,” Lyndee said. Lyndee and Trinity were volunteering with Kathy Carr, vice board chair of the Wasatch Community Foundation, which was a sponsor of the event. Carr said the nonprofit’s booth, right next to The Pretzel Connection’s, was about 20 feet away from the bottle.  Carr noticed library director Juan Lee talking to the police officers. A few minutes later, library staff and police calmly instructed attendees to evacuate into the library, keeping away from the windows. Scott said they were inside the library for about an hour.  During that time, the Heber City Police Department and Wasatch County Sheriff’s Office deployed a K-9 trained to sniff out explosives and ammunition. The K-9 gave a positive indication on the bottle.  “I was able to see that, when the dog alerted, he alerted twice and then jumped up in the bush,” Lyndee said. “My daughter was saying, ‘Oh my gosh. Is this thing going to explode?’ It was crazy and nerve-wracking just waiting, wondering if we’re going to make it out.” Carr said there were about 300 people at the event, many families with toddlers.  Keeping the children entertained and blissfully unaware of the situation as they waited in the library was its own challenge. “(Trinity) went and helped little kids look for books during (the lockdown) and then came back and was … getting updates,” Lyndee said. Carr, meanwhile, spoke to some of the younger children about what role a K-9 plays in law enforcement and pointed out how “cool” it was to see one in action, protecting its community. All the while, she was mentally preparing herself to, at a moment’s notice, push over tables in the library to use as barricades. Carr said emergency drills she’d done in her past roles as a teacher and an organizer and accreditor of after school programs prepared her for that moment.  “That mom side of me and that teacher side of me kicked in a little bit,” she said. “It’s just in my nature to make sure the kids are OK. That’s the No. 1. Make sure they’re calm and that this isn’t going to be traumatic for them.” Police instructed patrons and staff to evacuate the library after the K-9 checked each car in the parking lot. At that time, police were also closing off 1200 South. Police Chief Parker Sever said that one car was found with a legally obtained gun and ammunition in it but that it was unrelated to the incident. A Salt Lake City-area bomb squad used a robot to neutralize and dispose of the suspicious bottle found at Wasatch County Library on Saturday morning. Credit: Photo courtesy of Heber City Police Department Carr went home and waited for about two hours for an update about when she could return to the library to retrieve the belongings she’d left behind.  The Heber Valley resident of four decades’ first assumption about the bottle was that it had been a prank because “it’s Heber,” but as she waited, she began to second guess herself. “I just kept listening for sirens from my house,” Carr said. During that time, a Salt Lake City-area bomb squad assisted the police department in disposing of the bottle using a bomb squad robot. Sever said “nothing explosive” was found in the bottle. The Police Department’s investigations team is actively working to determine the circumstances surrounding the incident.  Sever said bomb threats are “not super common” in Heber City and that there have been two others, at Wasatch High School and the Heber Valley Hospital, during his nearly three years as police chief. Many witnesses are still grappling with the aftermath of the incident. “It makes me sad if this was, one, a targeted event, and two, if it was a prank. It’s not funny,” Lyndee said. “Heber is growing, and it’s getting crazier, but I never thought that we’d have to be evacuated and have the bomb squad up here.” Unlike Lyndee, this was not the first emergency situation Carr had been present for. A gas leak on Main Street in 1994 forced the evacuation of “a few hundred” people to Central Elementary School (now the Heber City Public Safety building), where Carr was running an after school program with about 25 kids. “That actually caused me to have a lot of questions because I started asking people, ‘If there was a big emergency, where would everyone evacuate? Where are the blankets?’ Because I had no idea how long people were going to end up staying at the school. I think they were able to clear it up by maybe 8 o’clock at night,” she said. “The early ’90s, compared to now, we are so much more prepared. … We have way more officers now that are on duty.” Both Carr and Lyndee complimented library staff and police officers for handling the situation calmly. “This could have been a lot more hectic and a lot more dangerous. I mean, there could have been stampedes,” Lyndee said. “The library staff did awesome, helping us evacuate, helping us get the information we needed as updates became available. The police did an outstanding job.” Carr is well aware that the bomb threat has likely left many of the families who came for the summer kickoff party with lasting trauma. She encouraged talking to a trusted friend, family member, mental health counselor or religious leader. Carr’s advice to anyone who finds themself in an emergency situation is to grab their keys, phone and kids and immediately move to a secure area, calling the authorities only when it is safe to do so. As for after the incident? “Take your kids for ice cream and distract them, and just tell them that the police are doing their job and that sometimes things happen, and you’re going to be protected because you’re with your parents and you’re with a trusted adult,” she said. “Or Kathy Carr will help you because she will do whatever it takes to keep you safe.” The post ‘Wondering if we’re going to make it out’: Heber City residents recount bomb threat at Wasatch County Library appeared first on Park Record. ...read more read less