Not directly related to this story but...
When I joined my first airline I was surprised to learn that quite a few of my flight deck colleagues had in their address books the telephone numbers of the news desks of the major newspapers and TV stations no doubt with an eye to making a bob or two for alerting said media organisations to stories of aeronautical interest. (But not if it involved them obviously!). Perhaps Despatcher Dan also had an eye to the main chance and contacted the DM himself.