[chris]

Five teenagers who crashed off a rural road outside Longmont, Colorado, at night made three separate 911 calls as they tried to tell a dispatcher where to find them, according to Dispatch Magazine On-Line, a public-safety trade publication that reviewed the recordings and local reporting on the wreck.

The teens reached a Larimer County dispatcher and worked to fix their location in the dark, retracing the route they had driven from a local high school. It took three calls before responders could pinpoint the crash site.

Several of the teens were badly hurt. They suffered serious leg injuries, and two of the boys each had a leg amputated, according to the same account.

Dispatch Magazine On-Line pointed to the calls as an example of how hard it can be for injured callers to describe a rural location, and for call-takers to place them, when there is no clear cross street or landmark to name.

The Longmont Times-Call reported the crash and posted the 911 audio, which the trade publication summarized in February 2007.