Aberfan. 54 years ago today.

[MaidenMotherCrone]

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

That's an incredible photo @PoltergeistPirates

Thank you, Rae36, I agree.

RIP those lost.

I discovered this a year or two ago, it's photos and commentary from Chuck Rappaport for time magazine. He didn't photograph the disaster, he wanted to tell the story of afterwards and took photos from the start of November until January.

www.amateurphotographer.co.uk/technique/a-town-without-children-aberfan-photographs-from-1966-99328

blog.library.wales/i-c-rapoport-photographs-of-aberfan-disaster/

That photograph is heartbreaking.

I remember watching it, as did most people at the time. Small black and white tv. I think it was probably the first situation that was filmed as it unfolded. It was horrendous, almost impossible to grasp what had happened because it was hard to work out what you were seeing. A nightmare scene where the normal relatable landscape features of streets, houses, roads had disappeared under the filth that had swept down from the hill. You could not work out what the frantic rescuers were doing, but the sense of desperation disbelief and despair came over strongly and was heartbreaking.

If you remember watching 9/11 then that is the only thing I can compare it to.

When people moan about health and safety at work I always want to make them re watch those images, because that is what happens if we let greedy people take short cuts with safety to save money.

@IHateWasps

Parents were interviewed to see how close they were to their dead children. Hard to imagine such unbelievable callousness.

That was apparently the Charity Commission's plan but thankfully the trustees refused and the plans were dropped so the parents didn't have to suffer that additional insult, but it's horrendous enough that it was considered for even a second.

Awful, what was the purpose of doing that?

The NCB just didn’t care and not one of the lost their job. The spring under the slag heap was marked on the OS map. My DB lives close by and my DM was from further down the Valley.

Gwyn Thomas’s Eulogy is heartbreaking
www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-wales-37717604

@JanewaysBun the suggestion was that they should decide how much compensation each family got based on how close they were to their children...

They then decided on £50 per child (I think not sure in case if two children) which was increased to £500. It was decided they shouldn't give more compensation than that because poor people wouldn't know how to cope with such a sudden influx of wealth... Which is some more horrific attitudes towards working class families from those running the country.

Awful, what was the purpose of doing that?

They proposed that parents who supposedly weren't so close to their children would receive less compensation than those who were very close.

I am from South Wales and was a child in school when this happened. I remember it clearly and I also remember donating my pocket money to the fund - which was stolen by the NCB. The treatment of those families was disgusting and the fact that no-one ever took responsibility is shocking but it still happens today - Grenfell will be another. It makes me cry every year but they are tears of anger

I've recently read a book about dark tourism where the author visits places such as ground zero, the killing fields and auschwitz. He visits Aberfan but concludes that it really isn't a place for tourism (🤨 obviously not I would have thought) and that people living there do not want people visiting. The way he describes walking around the village and seeing the graves is heartbreaking but honestly I don't know what he was expecting. He shouldn't have gone.

I had heard about Aberfan but as a pp said only really read up on it after watching the episode of The Crown. It took me 3 goes to get through that episode. How those parents coped I do not know.

@terrywynne gosh that's so heartless, awful.

I come from nearish there and member being told about it at school

No words are sufficient.

If anyone listens to Soul Music on R4, one of the pieces once was the haunting Welsh song Myfanwy.

One of the Aberfan rescuers spoke, and chose Myfanwy. It is online and I recommend it.

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.

That has really touched me.

I recently read a book about it, and posted on here about the wide range of dates as the book was borrowed from the library, and it matters so much that people remember and I hope it brings comfort to those left behind that we do remember and we do still care.

@PoltergeistPirates

Not sure which organisation “owns” the image these days. But this particular copy of it belongs to me.

Bloody Hell @PoltergeistPirates. That has just made me cry. I've seen quite a few photos but never that one.

My son does a lot for the community and social justice and it was Grenfell that stirred this in him. We all must remember. We all must learn. We all must care.

So lovely to see so many of us do.

@grannycake

I am from South Wales and was a child in school when this happened. I remember it clearly and I also remember donating my pocket money to the fund - which was stolen by the NCB. The treatment of those families was disgusting and the fact that no-one ever took responsibility is shocking but it still happens today - Grenfell will be another. It makes me cry every year but they are tears of anger

I am so sorry for you and sorry if this sounds trite but reading your post I can just picture you as a child and it makes me want to repay you your pocket money.

Tomorrow I will donate to whatever children's charity box I see when I am out.

SunshineCake

It makes me cry too.

Plentyn Aberfan, an Aberfan child. A pantglas pupil. Thank you. Diolch o galon

I remember my mother crying in the kitchen the day of Aberfan. She'd grown up not far from there. The tragedy of the village and the loss of all those little lives is something that I'll never forget.

@Words

No words are sufficient.

If anyone listens to Soul Music on R4, one of the pieces once was the haunting Welsh song Myfanwy.

One of the Aberfan rescuers spoke, and chose Myfanwy. It is online and I recommend it.

www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/b0418kfw

I watched this a couple of weeks ago. It's very well done.

I remember learning about Aberfan for the first time in a training session at work. I believe some of our health and safety laws came in as a result.
RIP to all who were lost.

It happened a few days before I was born. My mum was a primary school teacher and was on maternity leave. She used to tell me how she was listening to the radio as it unfolded and the horror of it being apparent. I can't believe how those poor families were treated.

29 years later i was pregnant with ds2, driving to a work meeting when there was a news flash on the radio saying there had been an incident in a primary school on Scotland. By the time I came out of the meeting the details of Dunblane were coming through. Just horrendous

RIP xx