To remind people of the minute silence

[Famalam13]

Posting here due to traffic.

Today is 50 years since the Aberfan disaster in which 116 children and 28 adults died. A minute silence will be held at 9:15am.

So so dreadful. My heart goes out to everyone involved.

On BBC news there was a lady who'd survived but lost her brother, sister and all her friends. It's unimaginable.

My family are from the area and its part of my consciousness.

I am really glad it is being remembered.

I have no words to express my feels towards the managment of the NCB at the time.

I had never heard of this before. So glad that these people are being remembered and people who didn't know about it can learn about it.

NCB were total bastards - and the government taking money out of the disaster fund! A labour government too!

We might whine about health and safety today, but at least we've come a long way.

The first time I heard about this was last week on R4. Unimaginable.

Wiki is a fairly interesting read about it - quite factual. I'm not sure I could cope reading lots of personal accounts, it is so sad. We all hear how awful the Sun was after Hillsborough - but the National Coal Board carrying on for years after creating such a harrowing tragedy, incredible

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster

I thought the BBC was shocking with its 20 seconds of silence, I was flicking between sky and bbc to see if anyone was actually bothering to cover it.

Im an 80's child and only knew about it in 2012??? when i saw the news with the queen opening the new school, so googled what happened. I didn't know about the subsequent cover up, no wonder they are angry. Bloody disgusting. The BBC link had me sobbing at the police man giving those poor children a cwtch before 'bed'. Just tragic, so tragic.

I wished i had held mine tighter before school this morning

The first disaster I can recall ever hearing about as a child. It shook me then and reading that letter, heartbreaking.

Heartbreaking.

I was a child when it happened & I remember seeing it in the news, but the full horror of it didn't touch me until I was much older.

There was a program on Radio 4 on last Saturday morning between 9 and 10 am about Aberfan, it reduced me to tears there was a man talking about how was in the school in one of the classrooms which was crushed and was placed with children who had died and it was only someone noticed his feet moving/twitching did they realized he was still alive.

Please watch the Aberfan wives club on itv player. I cried my eyes out all the way through. So sad.

I missed the silence unfortunately, but I do my own.

I remember my Mum telling my about it. She was 10 when it happened so I guess it struck a chord with her. Such an awful tragedy, it would have been bad enough but the way it was handled afterwards was horrendous. Thinking of everyone affected, RIP

One fact that has stuck with me was that there was a young girl who should have been in school but was going in late as she was going to the doctor, I think most, if not all, of her classmates died.

jagua going to watch it tonight.

The last child to come out alive would be out in half hour. Absolutely heart breaking.

alison

Thank you for this link - absolutely heartbreaking, but so important to read. I have never seen such pain in a letter - so powerful.

I was very touched though to read these words:

All through the night we worked, talking to people or trying to, because how can you talk reasonably to mothers who have just identified a dead child?

Such empathy and respectful consideration for those who had lost their beloved children. Such a contrast with the often very intrusive journalism today - particularly in America.

This very consideration gave the account so much more power (I know it was a private letter and not an article, but it is obvious that the writer would never have dreamed of intruding on such incredible grief).

I was 13 when the Aberfan disaster occurred, and can remember it being reported, and how shocked and horrified everyone was, but I don't think anyone could possibly have pictured the horror of the reality.

Robens and the others who then tried to minimise, and slither out of their responsibilities, should have been forced to watch - even take part- in the digging, the way the concentration camp guards were.

Those poor children; those poor families. There are no words.

I watched the documentary on BBC iplayer and bawled my eyes out. Utterly heartbreaking.

There was a lady saying they'd bought her daughter new shoes, she had wanted to wear them to school that day but she hadn't let her. She never saw her alive again and wished she'd let her wear the shoes, she was only 8 years old.

My DD turns 8 in a few weeks, it doesn't bear thinking about :(

My DM listen to it on the Radio as it unfolded (before I was born) and found it really distressing. I knew about it and found it upsetting because a few years later when I would be young primary age there was a report on the radio about it and she was crying and then when I asked her what the matter was she started sobbing - it was just like our (small) primary school. That made a huge impact on me. Also she said at the time a reporter had tried to interview a man who was digging with his bare hands - there weren't enough shovels and he had children under there...a mixture of how unthinkably terrible for the father and how could the reporter.
I could never even think about it without tears in my eyes...and worse now my children have been to a similar primary...I know I would have been digging with my bare hands too.
The fact it could have been prevented just adds another layer of horror.
I have thought about those children and their families for many minutes over the years...

trigger warning, very very emotional.

aberfan.walesonline.co.uk

once you feel, it will be too hard to bear

I'm crying here.

I remember learning about this in Geography at school and it haunted me then.

Heard on the radio today that some families lost more than one child, the tragedy is indescribable. A whole generation of village children wiped out

golden that story about the shoes brought a lump to my throat

I didn't know about it until it was in the radio times the other week. A survivor had written about it and said that he was given counselling but they said to think of happy things like birthday parties but he said that that made him think of all his friends who wouldn't be at any more birthday parties. Such a terrible thing for a small boy to deal with. Dm remembers it. It is just unimaginable.

Its a horrible horrible disaster. I must admit im shocked anyone didnt know about it. Im alot younger than it but every year my mum mentioned it. She was teacher training in wales at the time and remembers all the men leaving the class and going to try and help but sadly there was nothing they could do. Those poor families. Rip xxxx

I didn't know about the minute's silence until I read this thread.
I was shopping in Asda at 9-15 this morning.
The silence was not mentioned there.

I had never heard about this until today. How utterly heartbreaking. The pain of the community is just unthinkable. I will watch the documentaries tonight, when LO is in bed.

I didn't know about the minutes silence, but will light some candles tonight. I have family buried at the cemetery in Aberfan, unconnected with the disaster, but it is an incredibly poignant place to visit, and to see the memorial to those who died. It touches me deeply.