Some of you may be aware of the four miners trapped underground in a small Welsh mine in the Tawe valley above Swansea. Gleision Colliery, at Cilybebyll near Pontardawe, is a small privately-owned coal mine. Nothing like the scale of the deep shaft mines that used to litter the Welsh valleys further East and where my maternal grandfather was a miner, in a colliery in Aberbargoed, back at the beginning of the 20th C. He left following long-term strike action around 1910 and walked to Newport to sign up with the Army. .
Anyway, this is a small drift mine, but there are extensive workings and some of these are close to long-abandoned and forgotten workings over a century old. When I checked up about this mine on-line, it was mentioned that it always had severe water problems . . . One of these old mine workings may have been breached yesterday morning when, having set off a small detination to bring down more coal, a sudden influx of water flooded the level. Two men managed to escape, and they rescued a third, badly-injured miner, who is now in intensive care in hospital. This left 4 men unaccounted for. Sadly, the falling water levels from constant round-the-clock pumping, revealed the body of one of the 4 trapped miners. Four families wait in fear to discover which of them has lost one of their menfolk. . . . Friday teatime update: another two bodies have been found, but there is still hope that they may find the one remaining miner alive . . . Further update: they have just found his body. R.I.P. four good men: fathers, sons, husbands, brothers or whatever. They will be missed.
It is hoped that the remaining three may have survived in other dead-end tunnels in pockets of air above the flood levels. No contact has been established, however. We must wait and see. Please remember them in your thoughts and prayers.
May God be with the families of these miners and may there be good news to come for those waiting to hear about their loved ones.
ReplyDeleteFlowerLady
Hope the next few hours bring better news - they are certainly in my thoughts.
ReplyDeleteMembers of my family too went to work in the mines of south Wales when the lead mines closed here in Shropshire. I suppose it was the work they knew and the needed work to keep body and soul and large families together. I have bee down one of the lead mines and even with the benefit of a guide and a powerful torch it was not somewhere I wanted to be for too long. I was glad to see the breathe the clear air again outside.
I read the headline yesterday and noted that the mine disaster was in your part of the world.
ReplyDeleteFor a number of years -1977-1980] J. delivered and helped set up coal crushers in Kentucky [our home state now] West Virginia and Pennsylvania. He was several times invited to go underground to view the workings--and never was inclined to take up the offer.
We live west of the coal mining area but one can't avoid awareness of mine tragedies--they are well-documented on the PBS history programs and in handed-down folks songs and stories.
Those poor waiting families......wouldn't one be waiting each day for the end of a shift and the safe arrival home of the men?
Both the miners and their families have been in my thoughts all morning BB - terrible and so awful that none of the families yet know which loved one has been lost - nor do they know what hope there is for the other three. All we can do is wait.
ReplyDeleteThe wait is over - and but awfully no good news. Such a sad, sad day.
ReplyDeleteThose families will need their community as they never have before Fi. I'm off to light a candle for their menfolk.
ReplyDeleteTragic, tragic news. I can only begin to imagine what their families are feeling.
ReplyDeleteThere was a fleeting ticker line on our news last night about this. Prayers for the families and communities.
ReplyDeleteSad days. Our fossil fuels come at a great human cost.
ReplyDeleteHow truly sad. I will be remembering these families and their loved ones in my prayers.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up in London, but fully aware of of my Valley roots, each mining disaster strikes hard, the possibility that a moderately close relative could be involved. None more so than Aberfan. Happened just before I started school, and even at that young age, I felt so close to it. A few years later we drove the road to Ponty, and saw all those new white stones on the opposite side of the valley. It tore me apart.
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