The Prince and Princess of Wales have paid an emotional visit to a Welsh village to remember to the victims of the Aberfan disaster.
The disaster, one of the worst in British history, saw 116 children and 28 adults killed when a waste tip slid down a mountain into the Aberfan in 1966.
The slurry engulfed Pantglas Primary School and neighbouring homes after schoolchildren had returned from an assembly where they sung All Things Bright and Beautiful.
Today, people gathered on the street to greet William and Kate as they arrived at the Aberfan Memorial Garden. They were guided around the garden by Aberfan survivor David Davies, a former pupil at Pantglas Primary School, and Professor Peter Vaughan, Lord Lieutenant of Mid Glamorgan.
They met trustees from the Aberfan Memorial Trust who are involved in ensuring the maintenance of the garden, alongside some of the Aberfan Wives group who lost relatives in the disaster.
They later bowed their heads to pay their respects to the victims and left a floral tribute, which simply read: "In loving memory."
The memorial garden, opened by the late Queen in 1974, stands on the site of the former school and commemorates the victims of the disaster.
William's late grandmother visited Aberfan eight days after the tragedy and shortly after a mass funeral had taken place. Her decision not to visit sooner was said to have been one of the greatest regrets of her reign.
She reportedly feared: "People will be looking after me, so perhaps they will miss some poor child that might have been found in the wreckage."
Despite this, mourners gathered to meet her and the bond she made with those she spoke to during that visit on October 29, 1966, endured throughout the rest of her life.
In 1974, she opened the garden to commemorate the victims and provide a place for bereaved families, survivors and the community to pay their respects.
In the crowd before William and Kate entered the garden today was disaster survivor Gareth Jones, 63, who crawled out of a window of the school as his classmates were buried alive by the black landslide.
Gareth chatted with Kate outside the memorial gardens and said: "I told her I was a survivor - I think she was quite surprised.
"She said she has three little children herself and can’t imagine what we went through. She said she felt for all the bereaved parents.
"I spoke to Prince William after, he wanted to know the effect on families in the aftermath of what happened.
"I told him: “We just had to get on with it."
"The Royal family have never forgotten us and it was lovely to see the new Prince and Princess of Wales here to pay their respects.
"People think the disaster is ancient history but to me it feels like it happened the other day.
"I'm sure Prince William was told what happened here when he was growing up, it’s embedded in the royal family - there's a special bond between us."
Gareth, just six at the time, met the Duke of Edinburgh when he visited the village the day after the school was engulfed by the moving mountain of coal waste.
The father-of-three never blamed the Queen for not turning up to console villagers until eight days after the horror.
Gareth, who has lived in the village all his life, said: "To me, she held back as a mark of respect to the families who lost children.
"The Queen waited for the dust to settle, I still think it was the right thing to do. She was showing respect to the people of Aberfan.”
Yesterday, on the first day of their two-day visit to Wales, William and Kate were introduced to two former mountain rescuers, Bob Thomas and Nick Richards, who had helped with the Aberfan school tragedy in October 1966.
And one reassured William his grandmother had done the right thing in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy.
William said: "It must have been terrifying. My gran told me many times she visited."
And Bob, 75, told the Prince of Wales: "Your family did the right thing as they didn’t visit for a week and it would have been a distraction."
William and Kate met the pair after they abseiled together off a cliff in the Brecon Beacons, while meeting mountain rescuers.
William and Kate travelled to a wet and windy area of the Bannau Brycheiniog near Merthyr Tydfil in the South Wales Valleys wearing hiking gear, and put on safety equipment ready for the descent.
They were guided through the process by the Central Beacons Mountain Rescue Team, a volunteer-run organisation which responds to calls 24 hours a day, all year round.
They also engaged in other training activities such as medical support exercises and watched a search dog rescue demonstrations, while hearing from current and former team members about their experiences spanning the organisation’s six-decade history.
After leaving the Brecon Beacons, they travelled the short distance to Dowlais Rugby Club in Merthyr Tydfil where many of the mountain rescue team socialise when off-duty.
William and Kate immediately went to the Little Dragon Pizza Van parked in the car park and ordered 12 pizzas to say thank you to the volunteers.
The royals carried the pizzas into the rugby club for the rescuers and met other members of the team and community.
Before leaving, William and Kate posed for photos and spoke with members of the public who had gathered outside to catch a glimpse of them.
