We still live
FIFTY years on, Jeff Edwards still sees the dead girl, her head cradled on his shoulder.
Two children, crushed together when a colliery waste tip slipped its footings, burying their school in heavy sludge.
Just eight years old, Jeff lived – suffering head and stomach injuries, pinned beneath a wall of debris.
“I was talking to another survivor recently – and he said the difference between life and death that day was about three inches,” says Jeff.
“The child next to him was three inches away. That would have been the same with me.
“I had nightmares for a long time after. Sometimes I couldn’t cope with the flashbacks of being trapped in that circle of air.
“The girl on my shoulder comes back continuously. I changed overnight, I was no longer a child. Lots of my friends died.”
It was the day before half-term – October 21, 1966 – and Jeff had been looking forward to the holiday as he knuckled down for the first lesson at Pantglas Primary School in Aberfan, South Wales.
HEAPS
Then at exactly 9.15am, disaster hit the close-knit community.
A giant tip of rock and shale that loomed high in the hills above, one of several towering heaps of spoil from nearby Merthyr Vale Colliery, collapsed after heavy rain.
It was a tragedy many had feared for years, but desperately hoped would never be seen – or heard.
With a colossal roar, a suffocating wall of slurry thundered downhill, as powerful as a tsunami, smothering all in its path.
First a farm, flattened under thousands of tonnes of mining waste, then some terraced houses – then the school.
Almost half a generation in the village was wiped out – 116 children under 11, along with 28 adults.
“One minute I was listening to the teacher in a maths lesson, the next I was buried,” recalls Jeff. “I d i d n’ t know what the hell had happened. As it came down from the mountain it smashed the windows with such force. “It piled over one side and I had a little pocket of air I could breathe in. I was very lucky. A lot of children died because they couldn’t breathe. “Big heavy beams and desks fell on top of me. I tried and struggled to get out but I just couldn’t. “There was a little girl’s head on my shoulder. She had died, so I couldn’t move. I was frightened because that was the first dead person I had ever seen.” For nearly two hours Jef f remained wedged beneath his classmate. The debris pinned him down, with several feet of soupy coal slurry on top. He was dragged out some time after 11am, the last miraculous survival there would be that day – the final Pantglas Primary child brought out alive.
Jeff was saved in part by his striking mop of blond hair, which stood out as a beacon to rescuers in the murky black that encased the school building.
“All I could see was a bit of light coming through,” he recalls with amazing clarity. “There was a little gap – the fireman who got me out actually saw my white hair.
“They got somebody down and were able to pick me out.”
By chance, Jeff came face-to-face with his rescuer 16 years ago while serving on the local council.
It was in a casual conversation