Aberfan. 54 years ago today.

[MaidenMotherCrone]

116 children died. 144 people in total.
Just heartbreaking.

It’s absolutely heartbreaking still. It also underlines why the much maligned health and safety is so very important.

I can't imagine the unspeakable horror for those parents and the magnitude of the grief of that many families being bereaved, including of small children, all at once in one village. I don't know how they survived, totally horrifying.

Gosh I remember it. I was 5; my mum let me send a lovely wool blanket to the a Blue Peter appeal to help those who lost everything.
I was too young to understand that meant their beloved children.

Dreadful. I can’t imagine.

A genuine horror story when it happened, the warning signs that it could happen and the life long aftermath for so many.

The wiki page has a photo that immediately shows the scale of the disaster for anyone unfamiliar.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster

Heartbreaking for all those concerned

The footage of the whole valley digging desperately for the children is just heartbreaking too.

Have never forgotten the shock of those images and never will !!

Thinking of those parents, families and the community x

In a way I thank the OP for reminding us of the tragedy, in the hope that there is never anything remotely like it again.

I still remember a tv programme years ago where they interviewed one of the children who had been off sick that morning. He was middle aged by then but said he had no one to play with growing up because there was no one left.

And it was totally preventable and had been predicted.

Tragic. The pictures are horrific and the fact that money was forcibly taken from the memorial fund to pay to get the remaining tips removed is so very shocking. And that nobody was punished or even fined for this entirely predictable disaster. Scandalous and heartbreaking.

One of the things that will help this tragedy live on in living memory is the use of related articles in gcse papers. Gives us the chance to remember those lost and discuss the lessons to learn to younger generations .

to those who lost a loved one.

sleepforever the treatment of the families afterwards by those in authority seems to have been quite callous and the use of the memorial fund to remove tips is disgusting.

So sorry for the children and families.

Still terrible to think about all this time later. My condolences to anyone that lost anyone

I learnt about it at school. Aboslutley tragic.

I can’t put into words how I feel about this. Remembering the victims and their families with great sorrow

The episode of the Crown showing this disaster was one of the most heartbreaking things I've ever watched. In fact I would say it is the most heartbreaking thing. It stayed with me for weeks afterwards.

Thanks for this post OP, I live near to Aberfan and it is very important that what happened isn’t forgotten. As previous posters have mentioned, the horror of so many children lost was bad enough, but for the families fund to be stolen from them and nobody taking the blame for the disaster is unbelievable still.

It was the last day before half term, they were only in school for the morning. I remember reading one account where a little girl wanted to stay home, her dad told her no and sent her in. She didn’t survive.

Such a terrible, terrible day

Just read about this, absolutely heartbreaking, can't imagine how horrific it must have been

Like Hillsborough I get a visceral reaction when I think about this.

The absolute desperation of those parents. I cannot fathom it.

Our headmaster at Junior school often spoke about this. If I remember correctly he was a student at the time and helped try to dig people out

It’s the first piece of news I remember. It remains a tragedy despite the passing years. So unnecessary, so many wasted lives and destroyed families.