RIP Aberfan
 

I'm guessing the majority of you have little or no idea about this but tomorrow (21st) is the 45 year anniversary of the Aberfan disaster where an entire mountainside slid down in to the village and completely covered an infants' school. Many children perished. The **** at the NCB never fully accepted their blame in all of it and the following day the head of the Coal Board was too busy getting an award from a university in Surrey to attend the site of the disaster.

I get to Aberfan whenever I can and visit the Garden of Remembrance, there's such an eerie silence there. I won't be able to make it tomorrow but it will be affecting the whole community.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfan_disaster

and this is the *******, Alfred Robens, Baron Robens of Woldingham

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

I still remember visiting the garden when I lived in Brecon. There was a definite 'feel' to the place. Eerie silence maybe, I'm not sure but there was a powerful feeling that left a strong impression.

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

RIP ABBA fans

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

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---------- Post added at 23:28 ---------- Previous post was at 23:27 ----------

45 years?! R.I.P Little ones. :(

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

Whenever I pass by Aberfan I think about what happened that day.My husband's cousin tells how he walked all the way from where he was working to help out.

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

Should have been held to account for so many things he was responsible for. The sheer arrogance that appears to have been displayed by this pig headed snot nose is truely astounding and how then Prime Minister, Harold Wilson, rejected his resignation. It is documented on Wikipedia that it has been suggested that the resignation was 'bogus', because it's claimed Robens knew it would have been rejected anyway and that Robens left the NCB in 1971, claiming his 'tenure' was a success.

In today's political world, this would have been a scandal to beat all other scandals, forget Expenses claims and dodgy friendships with the Defense Secretary. This was a disaster which caused the death of 144 people, nearly all young children and not one single person as history tells it, was held to account nor sacked. I don't class this as an accident, this was completely criminal and it's a shame that 144 people had to die, but not in vain, to prove we needed Health and Safety laws.

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

Anyone read what happened to the disaster fund

The public demonstrated their sympathy by donating money, with little idea of how it would be spent. Donations flooded in to the appeal and within a few months, nearly 90,000 contributions had been received, totalling £1,606,929(2008:£21.4 million).

The management of this fund caused considerable controversy over the years. Many aspects of the aftermath of the Aberfan Disaster remained hidden until 1997, when the British Public Records Office released previously embargoed documents under the thirty year rule. These documents revealed new information about the machinations of Lord Robens, the NCB and the Charity Commission in the wake of the Aberfan Disaster.

At one point the Charity Commission planned to insist that before any payment was made to bereaved parents, each case should be reviewed to ascertain if the parents had been close to their children and were thus likely to be suffering mentally. At another meeting, the Commission threatened to remove the Trustees of the Disaster Fund or make a financial order against them if they went ahead with making grants to parents of children who had not been physically injured that day, and the Trustees were forced to abandon these payments.

Although the Davies Report had found that the NCB's liability was "incontestable and uncontested" and it was widely felt that the NCB should have to bear the entire cost of removing the dangerous tips above Aberfan, Robens refused to pay the full cost, thereby putting the Trustees of the Disaster Fund under "intolerable pressure". Robens then "raided" the Fund for £150,000 to cover the cost of removing the tips – an action that was "unquestionably unlawful" under charity law – and the Charity Commission took no action to protect the Fund from Robens's dubious appropriation of funds.


Robens really was a genuine first class piece of work...

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

I was a nipper when it happened but even than i understood that all those young lives being lost was a great loss. :(

R.I.P little ones

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

Read a lot about this disaster,and how people that should have been accountable avoided being held to account.

Never been there but feel for all those famillies that lost children that day RIP all the little ones.:(

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

Bit disappointed by the nation's general lack of memorial on such an important anniversary, very sad that we've just left the Welsh to it, we could've spared a minutes pause for all those little children

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

Personally I think it was better to keep the memorials at a local/Welsh level, due to the history and strong local ties of those who suffered at the time, and who still suffer with the horrendously awful mental scars of such a terrible disaster.

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

I remember collecting and packing blankets that were called for in a radio appeal.

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

I remember speaking to a chap years ago who'd been in the pub (or cinema) that evening, and as the news filtered through South Wales men were going around and rounding up volunteers to go to the village to do what they could to help, be it dig, carry or whatever else they could do. They simply wanted to help save anyone who was left alive, or at least get the bodies of the dead out so they could be given a respectful burial.

Re: RIP Aberfan
 

There have been a few programmes on the BBC about this terrible and avoidable tragedy.

It even took them two hours to turn off the broken water main that was hindering rescue efforts!