My father’s role in investigating Aberfan – and the sight he could never forget

Rescue workers move debris in an effort to reach children trapped in Pantglas junior school in Aberfan, Glamorgan, after it was engulfed by a sliding mountain of slag. Photograph: PA

Reading Gaynor Madgwick’s experience of the Aberfan disaster of October 1966 brought back memories of my father sitting at our kitchen table crying after returning from Aberfan on the evening of the disaster (A noise like thunder – then my classroom went black. How I lost my brother, sister and stability to the Aberfan disaster, 10 July). I was seven and my brother 12.

My father, who was a lecturer in civil engineering at Swansea University, had been asked some time during the morning of 21 October to join the investigation team. During the afternoon, and I think the following day, he was seeing children of my age being dug out of the remains of the primary school. It was a sight that he was never to forget.