Aberfan

cml387

On this day 50 years ago a slag heap collapsed and fell on a village in South Wales called Aberfan.
144 people were killed, most of them children from Pantglass primary school which was right in the path of the slip.

The BBC have put together this very moving description of the event.

Stigura

" Moving "?! F**king BBC. I lasted two pages. That was it. No more!

JupiterKid

It was a horrible tragedy. Practically an entire generation of children were wiped out. The valleys of South Wales where the coal was worked are very depressed and impoverished nowadays, especially that all the mining is gone.

One of the grimmest tragedies seen on these islands, so much worse than the bog burst in Rathmore 60 years before that wiped out a family, given the contribution man made to building the heap, the warnings about underlying springs that went unheeded, and the presence of a school in the pathway of the slide. And the sheer numbers, an entire generation wiped out and a town that suffered huge issues with PTSD, family problems, alcoholism etc. in the years that followed.

Charles Babbage

This was the first news item that I really remember, having just started school the idea of a school being wiped out made a definite impression, and I think we said a prayer for them. So unnecessary.

Conall Cernach

There was a survivor on the BBC this morning describing how he woke up on the other side of the classroom after it happened and found his best friend lying dead beside him with his head against his chest and a wee trickle of blood coming from his nose. It would have brought tears from a stone.

jimgoose

"Aberfan is different.

When men perished in their hundreds in some eruption of blazing methane, it was possible to view it with a kind of blind ferocity, the sort of ferocity we've always used in the face of war.

Men were below the earth doing a grim and unnatural job and sometimes the job would blow up in their faces and most of the doom was underground, out of sight, tucked tactfully away from the public view. But Aberfan is different."



RIP.

cml387

Stigura wrote: »

" Moving "?! F**king BBC. I lasted two pages. That was it. No more!

?
I thought it was quite well done.

It was also the first major disaster that I remember.

tobsey

cml387 wrote: »

?
I thought it was quite well done.

It was also the first major disaster that I remember.

I don't think they're criticising the BBC, it's the subject matter that's so hard to read. I'd agree it's very well done.

CPSW

Seen this mentioned on social media today, had no idea what they were referring to. Very sad story indeed

Stigura

cml387 wrote: »

?
I thought it was quite well done.

It was also the first major disaster that I remember.

Yeppers. Ye misunderstood my angle. Sorry.

It was all a bit too near the bone, for me. I was too strongly effected, from trying to read it. Personal thing.

Just told my brother about it, actually. He'll understand.

Elliott S

My grandfather was working on the construction of the Severn Bridge as a foreman at the time (or had travelled over to work on it in the preceding years, I'm not sure of he was still working on it). He joined the firefighting reserves whilst there. When this horrible event happened, the reserves were called in help with the recovery. One thing he told my father was that the recovery was very difficult because you were basically digging with your hands and with shovels through the wettest, densest of dirt. I don't want to think of some of the things he saw during that operation.

Elliott S

I've been reading that Beeb article. Makes me angry. :mad:

I always thought it had been an unforeseen incident, that they just didn't think a slag heap would do what it did. But it seems there was considerable concern about that particular slag heap from various different people and organisations. The article even shows a letter sent to the National Coal Board by a waterworks engineer! This could have been prevented.

It's so sad that it happened just 20 minutes into the school day and hours before the school broke up for mid-term break. Gah, why couldn't it have happened just half an hour earlier!

Very interesting that one of the survivors resolved never to have children himself.

Alun

I'm English and was 9 at the time. I remember it vividly as does my wife who was only 5. I can't say I really remember very much else in terms of world events from that time period, which only goes to show how much of an impact it had on everybody, even, or maybe especially given the circumstances, very young children.

Elliott S

Correction on my earlier post, as filled in by my pops. Construction had ended on the Severn Bridge and my grandpops was at this stage working on the construction of a dam near Aberfan. He was on a rescue team because there was a lot of accidents occurring in the construction of the dam, and the rescue team was called in to help in with the rescue and recovery at Aberfan.

mikeym

It must have been awful for the families and survivors after the tragedy.

So many young lives lost

cml387

One thing I do remember is the BBC main news that night.
Instead of the opening urgent-urgent music of those years it was just a silent opening live from Aberfan with arc lights lighting up the scene.

Elliott S

cml387 wrote: »

One thing I do remember is the BBC main news that night.
Instead of the opening urgent-urgent music of those years it was just a silent opening live from Aberfan with arc lights lighting up the scene.

Wow, what age were you at the time?

cml387

Elliott S wrote: »

Wow, what age were you at the time?

I was eight. As some have pointed out it was because it involved a school that it really hit home.

Elliott S

cml387 wrote: »

I was eight. As some have pointed out it was because it involved a school that it really hit home.

If you look at the aerial shots, it hit the school and little else. What horrible luck.

getzls

I was in Primary School myself then and my school organised a collection in aid of the victims.
Likely many schools did.

Elliott S

getzls wrote: »

I was in Primary School myself then and my school organised a collection in aid of the victims.
Likely many schools did.

I've been reading about how the funds raised were misappropriated.:mad: The NCB plundered the fund to clear up the slag heaps, even after it was determined that they were fully to blame for the disaster.

muddypaws

We moved to Crickhowell in Wales in 1974, about 20 miles from Aberfan, eight years after, but it was still very raw for everyone in that area. We went there one Sunday, was such a sad, sad place. I've seen the images this week, the white arches weren't there then, just rows of graves. As far as I remember, it was a drab day when we went, but that seemed fitting.

end of the road

Elliott S wrote: »

I've been reading about how the funds raised were misappropriated. The NCB plundered the fund to clear up the slag heaps, even after it was determined that they were fully to blame for the disaster.

the NCB were a nasty shower of bastards who couldn't care a less about anyone or anything. protecting themselves at all costs was their aim and "shur the victims can pay for the privelage" was their viewpoint.
they knew the tip was unsafe. they knew the geology of where they placed it was unsound. they had been told the same information plenty of times. they didn't give a damn, why was that, was it because it was a small village in wales so it didn't matter? who knows.
anytime they were complaints about the tips, the threat of closing the mine was used, a threat of the withdrawel of jobs or a service being a perfect way to silence those who complain about something.
a whole generation more or less wiped out, a community who has not truely recovered and probably never will deep down.
to add insult to injury, the ncb stole money from these people to clear up it's mess, nobody was convicted, they got away with it.

Widdershins

So sad. If only Health and Safety rules existed back then like they do now.

Elliott S

end of the road wrote: »

the NCB were a nasty shower of bastards who couldn't care a less about anyone or anything. protecting themselves at all costs was their aim and "shur the victims can pay for the privelage" was their viewpoint.
they knew the tip was unsafe. they knew the geology of where they placed it was unsound. they had been told the same information plenty of times. they didn't give a damn, why was that, was it because it was a small village in wales so it didn't matter? who knows.
anytime they were complaints about the tips, the threat of closing the mine was used, a threat of the withdrawel of jobs or a service being a perfect way to silence those who complain about something.
a whole generation more or less wiped out, a community who has not truely recovered and probably never will deep down.
to add insult to injury, the ncb stole money from these people to clear up it's mess, nobody was convicted, they got away with it.

And nobody in the NCB lost their job over it, which I find staggering. The chairman of the NCB offered his resignation but knew he'd never lose his job. And, most galling of all, he was given another plum job after he left the NCB involving, of all things, health and safety in the workplace. :mad:

igCorcaigh

Hate to drag up an old thread, but I have been looking into this tragedy recently, after viewing the episode of The Crown, actually.

The cruel mismanagement of the after effects of this man made disaster, and that to the people of Aberfan is horrendous, and I thought that this documentary is worth a watch for anyone interested in this terrible event.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPjD4QHYCuA

“The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.”

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-150d11df-c541-44a9-9332-560a19828c47

igCorcaigh

Valley Of Sorrow

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lzJLww3DvM

wildwillow

I visited the village many years ago. The lines of graves with the white arches was so poignant.

I was only in primary school when it happened but was always fascinated at a hill falling. I lived in a valley at the time as was frightened any hill could collapse.

Be right back

I came across this article which mentioned Aberfan.