WEBVTT - S04 Episode 9: Darkness in Sight 0:00:10.000 --> 0:00:13.720 Toward the end of Homer's Odyssey, a newly returned Odysseus 0:00:13.960 --> 0:00:17.760 dines in secret in his own home, surrounded by the Suitors, 0:00:18.440 --> 0:00:21.520 a group of vulgar men who for the past decade 0:00:21.720 --> 0:00:25.919 had been trying to steal his life. Disguised as a beggar, 0:00:26.400 --> 0:00:31.160 Odysseus watches with disgust as the men shamelessly stuffed themselves 0:00:31.320 --> 0:00:35.120 on meat and wine, blissfully unaware of the true identity 0:00:35.360 --> 0:00:38.199 of the stranger who sits among them and what he 0:00:38.240 --> 0:00:42.720 plans to do to them. When suddenly, the prophet Theoclymenus 0:00:42.960 --> 0:00:46.440 interrupts the banquet to deliver his fateful words to the 0:00:46.520 --> 0:00:51.360 unsuspecting suitors. There is a shroud of darkness drawn over 0:00:51.440 --> 0:00:55.280 you from head to foot. Your cheeks are wet with tears. 0:00:56.080 --> 0:01:00.200 The air is alive with wailing voices. The war and 0:01:00.360 --> 0:01:04.399 root beams drip blood, and the gait of the cloisters, 0:01:04.480 --> 0:01:08.320 and the court beyond are full of ghosts trooping down 0:01:08.640 --> 0:01:13.280 into the night of hell. And with that their fates 0:01:13.280 --> 0:01:16.479 were sealed in what is perhaps one of literature's most 0:01:16.560 --> 0:01:22.319 famous and brutal premonitions. Though the idea of prophecy was 0:01:22.400 --> 0:01:26.280 common among many ancient cultures throughout the world. Homer's use 0:01:26.319 --> 0:01:30.080 of it in Odyssey, produced sometime around eight hundred BC, 0:01:30.840 --> 0:01:33.120 is one of the first times such an act had 0:01:33.160 --> 0:01:39.720 been written about. Traditionally, supposed prophets and seers are individuals 0:01:39.800 --> 0:01:42.440 believed to have been gifted with the unique connection to 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:47.120 the divine, individuals that can communicate with the gods or 0:01:47.200 --> 0:01:51.400 tap into nature's hidden frequencies in order to deliver portentous 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:57.640 visions of the future. Sometimes the apparent visions arrive instantaneously, 0:01:58.280 --> 0:02:01.920 delivered as if by lightning, fully formed into the seer's 0:02:02.040 --> 0:02:08.640 mind's eye. Other times, divination might be employed, the prophecies 0:02:08.680 --> 0:02:13.400 carefully deciphered from the scattering of bones or rounds, or 0:02:13.480 --> 0:02:17.160 sometimes a message might merely be read in the language 0:02:17.160 --> 0:02:20.840 of the world around them, an eagle tearing a pigeon, 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:24.079 apart as in the case of Homer's Odyssey, for example, 0:02:24.639 --> 0:02:30.240 becoming the omen of a god's will. All such methods, 0:02:30.560 --> 0:02:34.760 aside from contradicting all scientifically accepted laws of the universe, 0:02:35.320 --> 0:02:39.240 would require a level of skill or understanding unknown to 0:02:39.280 --> 0:02:44.160 the average lay person. However, there is one place in 0:02:44.200 --> 0:02:47.920 which many, regardless of their level of skill, or understanding, 0:02:48.480 --> 0:02:51.919 believe they are granted access to the power of premonition 0:02:53.080 --> 0:02:59.040 in their dreams. You're listening to Unexplained and I'm Richard 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:10.320 mcclaim myth. As Aristotle pointed out as far back as 0:03:10.320 --> 0:03:14.800 the fourth century BC in his Treatise on Prophesying in Dreams. 0:03:15.600 --> 0:03:18.840 Perhaps it is merely because so many believe their dreams 0:03:18.840 --> 0:03:22.240 to possess a special significance that we are minded to 0:03:22.280 --> 0:03:26.920 give them that significance either way, whether we believe it 0:03:26.960 --> 0:03:30.600 to be true or not, Since most of us experience them, 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:34.040 the notion that somehow, with our dreams we possess the 0:03:34.160 --> 0:03:38.320 power to know and perhaps alter future events remains a 0:03:38.360 --> 0:03:44.040 potent one today. At institutions such as the Kessler Parapsychology 0:03:44.160 --> 0:03:48.600 Unit at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, the notion 0:03:48.680 --> 0:03:51.920 of precognitive dreaming tends to be viewed as little more 0:03:51.960 --> 0:03:56.600 than an illusion created by a combination of confirmation bias 0:03:56.920 --> 0:04:02.320 and selective recall. It may be surprising to know that 0:04:02.480 --> 0:04:05.120 not that long ago there were a number of credible 0:04:05.160 --> 0:04:10.120 academics who took the notion of such things very seriously. Indeed, 0:04:11.360 --> 0:04:15.880 one in particular, the psychiatrist doctor John Barker, having spent 0:04:15.920 --> 0:04:19.400 a number of years in the nineteen sixties studying incidences 0:04:19.400 --> 0:04:24.640 of apparent predictive dreams, eventually became convinced that such events were, 0:04:24.680 --> 0:04:29.640 in fact not unusual at all. In nineteen sixty seven, 0:04:30.040 --> 0:04:32.640 Barker even went as far as setting up his own 0:04:32.720 --> 0:04:36.880 Premonition's Bureau, in the hope that by collating people's dreams 0:04:36.920 --> 0:04:40.440 of impending tragic events, it might be possible to prevent 0:04:40.480 --> 0:04:44.240 them from taking place. It was a plan that had 0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:47.760 its seeds in a series of peculiar occurrences that came 0:04:47.800 --> 0:04:49.840 to light in the wake of one of the United 0:04:49.920 --> 0:04:55.320 kingdoms greatest tragedies of recent memory, a story that begins 0:04:55.360 --> 0:05:07.400 in nineteen sixty six in the valleys of South Cumry. Mummy, 0:05:07.880 --> 0:05:12.120 I'm not afraid to die, said erro May, absentmindedly watching 0:05:12.160 --> 0:05:15.400 the rain as it bucketed down outside the living room window. 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:19.640 Whatever do you mean, asked her mother, more than a 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:23.560 little unnerved by her daughter's matter of fact tone. It 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:26.280 certainly wasn't the sort of thing you expected a ten 0:05:26.360 --> 0:05:30.520 year old child to say, let alone one usually so 0:05:30.640 --> 0:05:34.720 bright and affable. In an effort to change the subject, 0:05:35.080 --> 0:05:38.719 her mother offered her a lollipop, but for once, errol 0:05:38.800 --> 0:05:42.600 May had no interest in taking it. I'm not afraid 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:46.839 because I'll be with my friends Peter and June, she said, 0:05:47.440 --> 0:05:50.600 before heading off to play in her bedroom, leaving her 0:05:50.600 --> 0:05:53.720 mother stunned and confused as to what on earth her 0:05:53.839 --> 0:06:04.760 daughter had been talking about. In October nineteen sixty six, 0:06:05.360 --> 0:06:08.279 erro May lived with her family in the village of Abavan, 0:06:08.760 --> 0:06:11.640 along the banks of the River Taff in South Cumrie. 0:06:13.040 --> 0:06:16.360 Known as a pit village, Abevan was established in the 0:06:16.440 --> 0:06:20.640 late nineteenth century primarily to service the mirth of Vale Colliery, 0:06:21.120 --> 0:06:24.120 where many of the villages a few thousand residents continued 0:06:24.160 --> 0:06:27.920 to work. Coal had been the lifeblood of the region 0:06:28.040 --> 0:06:31.839 for decades, having become a vital component in the ravenous 0:06:32.040 --> 0:06:36.159 or a borus of industrial revolution, feeding the flames to 0:06:36.240 --> 0:06:39.120 smelt the iron to make the machines that used the 0:06:39.200 --> 0:06:43.080 coal that fed the flames to make the machines, and 0:06:43.200 --> 0:06:47.800 so on and so on. By the late nineteen sixties, however, 0:06:48.240 --> 0:06:52.159 with increasing competition from more efficient sources of energy, the 0:06:52.200 --> 0:06:56.240 British coal industry was in steep decline. Not that you 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:58.480 would have known it if you were to visit southern 0:06:58.520 --> 0:07:01.760 Cumri at the time, where mines like Mirth of Alee 0:07:02.080 --> 0:07:06.720 had so far managed to avoid the downturn. Evidence of 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:09.720 just how dominant the industry was in the livelihood of 0:07:09.720 --> 0:07:13.320 Abevan could be seen in the black rain water that 0:07:13.480 --> 0:07:17.160 rushed through the streets during the heavier downpours, to the 0:07:17.200 --> 0:07:19.920 coal smiced faces of the eight hundred or so men 0:07:20.160 --> 0:07:23.280 who emerged from out of its pit each day, to 0:07:23.360 --> 0:07:26.520 the vast towers of spoil that loomed over the village 0:07:26.560 --> 0:07:31.840 to the west. Taken from the French word espoielier, meaning 0:07:31.880 --> 0:07:37.160 to seize by violence, these gigantic obsidian mounds were comprised 0:07:37.280 --> 0:07:40.720 largely of shale and any other waste materials removed in 0:07:40.760 --> 0:07:44.440 the process of mining, plundered from its natural habitat in 0:07:44.480 --> 0:07:48.080 the bowels of the earth, and piled perilously high above 0:07:48.160 --> 0:07:53.400 ground where it didn't belong. There were seven in total, 0:07:53.920 --> 0:07:56.960 with the largest stretching some eighty meters into the air, 0:07:57.880 --> 0:08:01.600 steadily turning the lush green valley into a mountain of black. 0:08:03.160 --> 0:08:05.680 Not that arrow May or any of the other children 0:08:05.720 --> 0:08:09.080 in the village minded too much, for the black stuff 0:08:09.160 --> 0:08:12.720 was all they had known some would even sneak off 0:08:12.760 --> 0:08:15.560 to play on the spoiled tips, or in the blackened 0:08:15.560 --> 0:08:19.960 streams that flowed steadily from underneath them. Not even rain 0:08:20.080 --> 0:08:25.440 would deter them. By mid October in sixty six, it 0:08:25.560 --> 0:08:29.480 had been raining solidly for near on two weeks. At 0:08:29.480 --> 0:08:33.160 times like those, with the slate gray clouds hanging so 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:36.719 low and heavy over the tips, it could feel as 0:08:36.720 --> 0:08:39.600 if the whole world might be about to turn gray. 0:08:40.640 --> 0:08:50.839 And something, it seemed, was stirring. It was two weeks 0:08:50.880 --> 0:08:53.839 after ten year old Errol May's peculiar talk of death 0:08:54.240 --> 0:08:58.400 that she was startled awake by a terrifying nightmare. Later 0:08:58.440 --> 0:09:01.600 that morning, she attempted to relay the details to her mother, 0:09:02.280 --> 0:09:05.800 but she didn't want to hear it, not now, she said, 0:09:06.280 --> 0:09:09.320 preferring to concentrate on getting her daughter ready for school. 0:09:10.520 --> 0:09:15.680 But mummy insisted arrow May, you have to listen, fine, 0:09:16.040 --> 0:09:20.839 but make it quick. She replied, you're going to be late. Well, 0:09:21.280 --> 0:09:24.880 said erro May, searching for the best way to describe it. 0:09:25.679 --> 0:09:28.800 I dreamt that I went to school, but there was 0:09:28.880 --> 0:09:33.079 no school there. Something black had come down all over it. 0:09:35.000 --> 0:09:38.560 Later that night, barely a street away from arrow May's home, 0:09:39.240 --> 0:09:41.680 eight year old Paul Davis was at the living room 0:09:41.720 --> 0:09:45.199 table drawing while his mother did the ironing in front 0:09:45.200 --> 0:09:48.640 of the TV. It was only after her son had 0:09:48.640 --> 0:09:51.640 gone to bed, as she packed away his things that 0:09:51.800 --> 0:09:54.400 Paul's mother got a proper look at what he had 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:58.080 been drawing. From what she could make out, it was 0:09:58.120 --> 0:10:01.720 a picture of the village, the peaked spoil heaps rising 0:10:01.800 --> 0:10:06.480 up behind it. Little stick figures holding shovels were dotted 0:10:06.520 --> 0:10:09.920 all about, while in the sky Paul had drawn a 0:10:09.960 --> 0:10:15.200 plane with the letters NCB for National Coal Board written 0:10:15.200 --> 0:10:19.840 on the side. Then Paul's mother was drawn to something 0:10:19.880 --> 0:10:24.240 odd in the top right hand corner, just two words 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:29.199 spelling out the end. Thinking little more of it, Paul's 0:10:29.240 --> 0:10:32.600 mother tucked the picture inside address a draw along with 0:10:32.640 --> 0:10:39.480 the rest of her son's crayon masterpieces. Are you always 0:10:39.520 --> 0:10:42.160 taking care of your family? Do you often take care 0:10:42.160 --> 0:10:45.160 of others and not yourself? Now it's time to take 0:10:45.200 --> 0:10:48.800 care of yourself, to make time for you. You deserve it. 0:10:49.320 --> 0:10:52.400 Tele doc gives you access to a licensed therapist to 0:10:52.440 --> 0:10:55.120 help you get back to feeling your best, to feeling 0:10:55.160 --> 0:10:58.680 like yourself again. With tele adoc, you can speak to 0:10:58.720 --> 0:11:02.520 a licensed therapist I phone or video therapy. Appointments are 0:11:02.520 --> 0:11:05.559 available seven days a week from seven am to nine 0:11:05.600 --> 0:11:09.880 pm local time. If you feel overwhelmed sometimes maybe you 0:11:09.960 --> 0:11:14.120 feel stressed or anxious, depressed or lonely, or you might 0:11:14.160 --> 0:11:18.040 be struggling with a personal or family issue, teledoc can help. 0:11:18.600 --> 0:11:22.800 Teledoc is committed to facilitating great therapeutic matches, so they 0:11:22.880 --> 0:11:25.760 make it easy to change counselors if needed. For free. 0:11:26.440 --> 0:11:31.400 Teledoc therapy is available through most insurance or employers. Download 0:11:31.440 --> 0:11:35.120 the app or visit teledoc dot com Forward slash Unexplained 0:11:35.160 --> 0:11:41.480 podcast today to get started. That's teladoc dot com slash 0:11:41.600 --> 0:11:51.320 Unexplained Podcast. Later that night, just over a hundred miles away, 0:11:51.400 --> 0:11:54.880 in a church in Plymouth, forty seven year old Caroline 0:11:54.920 --> 0:11:58.000 Miller was preparing to share a recent vision with her 0:11:58.040 --> 0:12:02.120 fellow spiritualists. As one of the group's more prominent members 0:12:02.240 --> 0:12:06.160 and a self described medium, Miller was a regular contributor 0:12:06.200 --> 0:12:10.080 to these private circle meetings, as she called them. On 0:12:10.120 --> 0:12:15.079 this occasion, however, she seemed more agitated than usual. It 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:18.800 was terrible, she said, just an avalanche of black coal 0:12:19.200 --> 0:12:22.920 hurtling down a mountainside and at the bottom, this young 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:26.080 boy staring up at it with a look of absolute 0:12:26.160 --> 0:12:30.280 terror on his poor face. Then suddenly there were tens 0:12:30.840 --> 0:12:34.400 hundreds of people digging into a mound of rubble, and 0:12:34.520 --> 0:12:39.000 that boy again. He was alive, but his faith full 0:12:39.040 --> 0:12:43.800 of so much grief. Sometime later, in the early hours 0:12:43.800 --> 0:12:48.400 of the following day, Imbarnstable, half way between Plymouth and Abervan, 0:12:49.080 --> 0:12:52.600 fifty four year old Mary Hennessy tossed and turned in 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:57.360 her sleep. Deep somewhere within her mind, she found herself 0:12:57.360 --> 0:13:01.120 standing in a school corridor, peering into nearby a classroom. 0:13:01.840 --> 0:13:05.000 Inside a small group of children appeared to be praying, 0:13:05.760 --> 0:13:07.839 and at the back of the room what looked like 0:13:07.880 --> 0:13:11.240 a series of wooden bars or pieces of wood was 0:13:11.320 --> 0:13:15.760 sticking out at the ground. Then suddenly the children began 0:13:15.840 --> 0:13:18.959 desperately trying to get through them to escape the room, 0:13:19.800 --> 0:13:25.079 but they were trapped. Moments later she was outside the building, 0:13:25.520 --> 0:13:29.520 watching helplessly as others frantically scurried about the place, a 0:13:29.600 --> 0:13:34.200 look of abject horror on their tear stained faces. Hennessy 0:13:34.280 --> 0:13:38.640 woke suddenly, gasping for breath, relieved to find herself safely 0:13:38.679 --> 0:13:42.720 at home in bed. She was so affected by the nightmare. 0:13:42.800 --> 0:13:45.760 She called her son first thing and begged him to 0:13:45.760 --> 0:13:49.480 take extra special care with his daughters that day. But 0:13:49.640 --> 0:13:52.120 as she recounted the dream to him, she had a 0:13:52.160 --> 0:13:57.280 sudden realization. Clearly it wasn't about her grandchildren, since they 0:13:57.280 --> 0:14:01.040 were little more than babies. That children that she'd seen 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:12.800 were school children. Back in Abervan. On the morning of Friday, 0:14:12.960 --> 0:14:17.360 October twenty first, though the rain had finally stopped, dawn 0:14:17.559 --> 0:14:20.600 revealed the village to be shrouded in a thick autumnal 0:14:20.640 --> 0:14:25.600 fog that rose high up into the valley all about. 0:14:25.640 --> 0:14:29.160 As some made their ways home, tired and exhausted from 0:14:29.320 --> 0:14:33.280 night shifts, others were just beginning to stir in their beds. 0:14:34.360 --> 0:14:37.760 Eight year old Gayner Minette was roused from sleep by 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:42.040 the sound of her mother preparing breakfast downstairs. Before long 0:14:42.160 --> 0:14:44.920 she was down there too, sat at the table next 0:14:44.960 --> 0:14:47.640 to her seven year old brother Carl and ten year 0:14:47.640 --> 0:14:51.800 old sister Marilyn. The trio were all pupils at the 0:14:51.880 --> 0:14:55.760 villages pan Class junior school, unlike their older sister, who 0:14:55.760 --> 0:15:00.200 had since graduated to secondary school. However, all four them 0:15:00.240 --> 0:15:03.280 were equally excited that morning since it was the last 0:15:03.320 --> 0:15:05.840 day of term, with the promise of a full week's 0:15:05.840 --> 0:15:10.560 holiday ahead of them. A short time later, all dressed 0:15:10.600 --> 0:15:13.480 and ready to go, the children headed out into the 0:15:13.520 --> 0:15:16.520 street as gain as mother waved them off from the 0:15:16.560 --> 0:15:21.480 front door, watching on as slowly, one by one they 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:27.720 disappeared into the fog. Out on the streets, children from 0:15:27.720 --> 0:15:30.560 all over the village were leaving their homes and making 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:34.480 their way to school, many knocking on neighbor's doors to 0:15:34.520 --> 0:15:39.000 collect their friends to make their journey together, some stopping 0:15:39.000 --> 0:15:41.880 off at Anderson's Touch shop along the way to grab 0:15:41.920 --> 0:15:46.600 cola cubes and flying sources. It was hard to keep 0:15:46.640 --> 0:15:49.800 track of everyone making their way along the street, the 0:15:49.840 --> 0:15:52.560 fog being so thick they could barely see a meter 0:15:52.960 --> 0:15:56.080 in front of them, But there was no mistaking the 0:15:56.200 --> 0:15:59.280 heavy scrape and clang of metal coming from the tram 0:15:59.280 --> 0:16:03.000 line to the the village as the waist carts, hidden 0:16:03.040 --> 0:16:06.160 somewhere in the fog steadily made their way toward the 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:09.640 top of Tip number seven. No matter where you were 0:16:09.720 --> 0:16:12.440 in Aberfan, you could always hear the sound of those 0:16:12.520 --> 0:16:17.280 carts trundling along, one after another, as bucket load after 0:16:17.360 --> 0:16:21.360 bucket load of waste was driven out west and discarded 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:32.560 onto those looming spoil heaps. Up At pank Glass Junior, 0:16:32.960 --> 0:16:36.120 on the northwestern edge of the village, sixty four year 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:39.160 old head teacher and Jennings stood watch from the front 0:16:39.200 --> 0:16:43.200 steps as the school's two hundred odd students emerged from 0:16:43.200 --> 0:16:47.680 out at the fog. Then, at nine am on the dot, 0:16:48.280 --> 0:16:51.600 the stern but much loved Jennings rang the bell to 0:16:51.720 --> 0:16:56.240 summon them all inside. As the children filed into the 0:16:56.240 --> 0:17:01.120 assembly hall. Inside one of the classrooms, newly installed Deputy 0:17:01.160 --> 0:17:05.840 head David Banon was prepping for the day's lessons. The 0:17:05.920 --> 0:17:08.359 forty seven year old Bayanon had only moved to the 0:17:08.440 --> 0:17:11.159 village with his family that summer after taking on the 0:17:11.280 --> 0:17:14.240 job as deputy head, and he had loved every minute 0:17:14.240 --> 0:17:18.920 of it. In the main hall, Miss Jennings conducted a 0:17:18.960 --> 0:17:22.040 short assembly as the children sat cross legged on the 0:17:22.040 --> 0:17:26.600 parquet floor before her. After finishing with the spirited rendition 0:17:26.760 --> 0:17:29.919 of all things bright and beautiful, she sent them on 0:17:29.960 --> 0:17:35.720 their way to class. But high up in those blackened hills, 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:38.760 all the way through the fog to the top of 0:17:38.800 --> 0:17:44.880 Tip seven, something was off. Earlier that day, when one 0:17:44.880 --> 0:17:47.399 of the crane drivers had arrived for his morning shift. 0:17:47.880 --> 0:17:52.400 He noticed something peculiar. The tracks of the crane appeared 0:17:52.400 --> 0:17:55.720 to have sunk a little into the tip, and if 0:17:55.720 --> 0:17:59.000 he wasn't mistaken, it appeared as though the entire top 0:17:59.040 --> 0:18:05.320 of it was lower than usual. Back at pank Glass, Junior, 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.280 eight year old Gaya took her place at a desk 0:18:08.359 --> 0:18:11.679 by the wall as her teacher, mister Davies, set up 0:18:11.720 --> 0:18:16.159 his blackboard by the window. The classroom was one of 0:18:16.280 --> 0:18:18.720 three at the back of the school that looked out 0:18:18.760 --> 0:18:22.800 directly onto the face of Tip number seven. In the 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:25.919 classroom beyond the wall to her right were mister Bannon 0:18:26.040 --> 0:18:29.400 and the nine to ten year olds, including her sister Marilyn, 0:18:29.800 --> 0:18:33.160 along with Errol May Jones and her two best friends, 0:18:33.200 --> 0:18:36.640 Peter and June. And in the classroom to the left 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:39.920 were sat the seven to eight year olds, including her 0:18:39.920 --> 0:18:44.920 younger brother Carl. With it just gone ten past nine, 0:18:45.200 --> 0:18:48.800 Gaya and her classmates were watching patiently as mister Davies 0:18:48.880 --> 0:18:51.840 drew up some math problems on the blackboard. When a 0:18:51.840 --> 0:18:56.359 few of them became aware of a distant rumble, Gaina 0:18:56.440 --> 0:18:59.359 looked out at the window, straining to see where an 0:18:59.359 --> 0:19:02.600 earth it might coming from, but saw only the thick 0:19:02.640 --> 0:19:06.880 fog at the bottom of the hill. Having by then 0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:10.520 heard it too, mister Davies reassured the children that it 0:19:10.560 --> 0:19:15.920 was only thunder. Only the thunder was getting louder. Then 0:19:15.960 --> 0:19:21.440 the lights dangling from the ceiling began to shake. It 0:19:21.480 --> 0:19:24.920 can't be, thought mister Davies, as he ran to the window, 0:19:25.600 --> 0:19:29.640 peering desperately into the fog as that hideous sound grew 0:19:29.680 --> 0:19:37.200 louder and louder, his eyes widening in helpless inescapable horror. 0:19:50.240 --> 0:19:53.600 It was shortly before nine fifteen am that the eight 0:19:53.800 --> 0:19:58.160 meter high spoiled Tip number seven, soaked through by two 0:19:58.240 --> 0:20:03.119 weeks of rain, collapse under its own weight. With nothing 0:20:03.160 --> 0:20:05.679 in its way to stop it. A half a million 0:20:05.800 --> 0:20:10.679 cubic foot avalanche of wet slurry, soil, and rock began 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:15.560 cascading toward Aberfan Village, moving at a speed of fifty 0:20:15.560 --> 0:20:18.920 miles per hour. The one hundred and fifty thousand ton 0:20:19.040 --> 0:20:23.600 mass first destroyed a farm along with its occupants, before 0:20:23.600 --> 0:20:29.040 obliterating eighteen homes and completely smothered pank Glass Junior School. 0:20:30.359 --> 0:20:33.800 As news of the collapse quickly spread, hundreds stopped what 0:20:33.840 --> 0:20:37.639 they were doing, grabbed shovels from gardens and raced immediately 0:20:37.720 --> 0:20:41.240 to help. Though the classrooms at the front of the 0:20:41.280 --> 0:20:44.160 school had survived the brunt of it, the three at 0:20:44.160 --> 0:20:47.159 the back had been so swamped by the spoil that 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:51.439 nothing inside of them could be seen. All about the 0:20:51.560 --> 0:20:55.600 ground was awash with thick black sludge as water gushed 0:20:55.600 --> 0:20:58.320 down from the hill and mixed with the coal dust. 0:20:59.440 --> 0:21:03.200 As anxious parents arrived to inspect the damage, many assumed 0:21:03.200 --> 0:21:07.000 the children had been evacuated from the building, only to 0:21:07.000 --> 0:21:10.680 realize with horror that half of them were still trapped inside. 0:21:12.200 --> 0:21:16.280 Before long, the school was completely surrounded by villagers and 0:21:16.320 --> 0:21:20.000 emergency services alike as they dug desperately at the mass 0:21:20.160 --> 0:21:24.800 to get them out. Others, in their anguish, began to 0:21:24.800 --> 0:21:28.119 claw at the muck with their bare hands, but for 0:21:28.200 --> 0:21:31.920 most of those still trapped under the rubble, it was 0:21:31.960 --> 0:21:38.240 already too late. Miraculously, eight year old Gayer survived the disaster, 0:21:38.800 --> 0:21:41.159 having been pushed to the back of the classroom and 0:21:41.280 --> 0:21:45.800 trapped under a radiator that saved her from suffocating. She 0:21:45.960 --> 0:21:49.720 was found alive just after nine thirty am, but her 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:53.800 younger brother Carl and older sister Marilyn were not so lucky. 0:21:54.960 --> 0:21:57.880 In fact, Gayner would be one of only ten children 0:21:58.200 --> 0:22:01.880 rescued from under the spoil, the last of them her 0:22:01.920 --> 0:22:07.760 class mate Jeff Edwards, being pulled out at eleven a m. 0:22:07.840 --> 0:22:11.400 The rescue workers continued to work tirelessly throughout the day. 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:15.080 Where first they had heard cries from under the rubble, 0:22:15.840 --> 0:22:25.960 they had very quickly fallen silent. A hundred and seven 0:22:26.000 --> 0:22:30.480 school children died that morning, along with five teachers, including 0:22:30.520 --> 0:22:34.240 twenty one year old mister Davies, head teacher Anne Jennings 0:22:34.800 --> 0:22:39.040 and deputy head mister Bannon, who, when his body was 0:22:39.080 --> 0:22:42.159 finally uncovered, was found to have been sheltering five of 0:22:42.200 --> 0:22:47.200 the children in his arms. Forty four year old Nancy Williams, 0:22:47.560 --> 0:22:51.000 a much loved staff member who like everyone else at 0:22:51.000 --> 0:22:53.400 the school, had come to see the children as her own, 0:22:54.000 --> 0:22:59.680 also died while trying to protect them. The Aberfan disaster 0:23:00.080 --> 0:23:05.320 was a national tragedy, uniting the country in grief. In total, 0:23:05.760 --> 0:23:09.600 one hundred and sixteen children and twenty eight adults lost 0:23:09.600 --> 0:23:15.120 their lives. Among them were ten year olds Errol May 0:23:15.200 --> 0:23:19.160 Jones and her friends Peter and June, as well as 0:23:19.200 --> 0:23:23.160 eighty year old Paul Davies. It was only a few 0:23:23.200 --> 0:23:27.879 days after the disaster that strange stories of portents and premonitions, 0:23:27.920 --> 0:23:33.240 apparently foretelling the event began to emerge. Chief among them 0:23:33.400 --> 0:23:37.320 was Errol May's peculiar dream and the strange proclamation she 0:23:37.480 --> 0:23:39.680 is said to have made in a few days prior 0:23:39.720 --> 0:23:44.440 to the tragedy. It was two weeks later, when going 0:23:44.440 --> 0:23:48.440 through her son's things, that Paul Davies's mother came across 0:23:48.480 --> 0:23:52.159 that unusual picture he had drawn, seeing its depiction of 0:23:52.200 --> 0:23:56.160 stick figures with shovels and the incongruous phrase the end 0:23:56.640 --> 0:24:02.520 in an entirely new light. Soon other stories would emerge too, 0:24:03.800 --> 0:24:09.440 news of premonitions of a different kind, with an entire 0:24:09.520 --> 0:24:12.560 nation demanding to know how on earth such a tragedy 0:24:12.600 --> 0:24:15.600 had been allowed to happen. Less than a week after 0:24:15.640 --> 0:24:20.720 it had occurred, a tribunal was established to investigate. Over 0:24:20.760 --> 0:24:23.720 the course of seventy six days, with one hundred and 0:24:23.760 --> 0:24:27.560 thirty six witnesses interviewed. The buck was passed back and 0:24:27.640 --> 0:24:31.439 forth as representatives of the National Coal Board attempted to 0:24:31.480 --> 0:24:36.800 deflect any sense of responsibility for the disaster. Having carried 0:24:36.800 --> 0:24:41.159 out their own investigation into the catastrophe, The NCB claimed 0:24:41.200 --> 0:24:43.680 it to have been the result of an unknown natural 0:24:43.760 --> 0:24:48.119 spring that had steadily destabilized the tip from underneath, of 0:24:48.240 --> 0:24:53.080 which nobody could have been aware. Only this was a lie. 0:24:54.560 --> 0:24:57.520 The NCB had been well aware of the spring, but, 0:24:57.680 --> 0:25:02.080 threatened by the increasingly competitive market, had elected not to 0:25:02.119 --> 0:25:05.760 incur the expense of moving the spoiled tip somewhere else. 0:25:07.359 --> 0:25:11.640 Not only that the same tip had even partially slipped 0:25:11.800 --> 0:25:17.239 only the year before. In fact, a petition raised by 0:25:17.280 --> 0:25:20.480 the mothers of some of the school children expressly stating 0:25:20.520 --> 0:25:24.240 their concern about the streams and springs under Pitch seven 0:25:24.880 --> 0:25:28.280 had even been delivered to Murtha County Borough Council that 0:25:28.440 --> 0:25:33.880 very same year, but nothing had come of it. As 0:25:33.920 --> 0:25:39.240 the tribunal ultimately concluded with or without apparent precognitive dreams, 0:25:39.880 --> 0:25:43.920 it seems the disaster had been well foreseen after all. 0:25:52.680 --> 0:25:55.320 If you enjoy listening to Unexplained and would like to 0:25:55.359 --> 0:25:58.560 help support us, you can now go to Unexplained podcast 0:25:58.640 --> 0:26:03.880 dot com forwards support. All donations, no matter how large 0:26:03.960 --> 0:26:09.600 or small, are massively appreciated. All elements of Unexplained are 0:26:09.640 --> 0:26:13.920 produced by me, Richard McClain smith. Please subscribe and rate 0:26:13.960 --> 0:26:16.639 the show on iTunes, and feel free to get in 0:26:16.680 --> 0:26:19.600 touch with any thoughts or ideas regarding the stories you've 0:26:19.600 --> 0:26:22.919 heard on the show. Perhaps you have an explanation of 0:26:22.960 --> 0:26:26.320 your own you'd like to share. You can reach us 0:26:26.320 --> 0:26:31.320 online at Unexplained podcast dot com, or Twitter at Unexplained 0:26:31.359 --> 0:26:42.600 Pod and Facebook at Facebook dot com. Forward slash Unexplained Now, 0:26:42.640 --> 0:26:45.639 it's time to take care of yourself. To make time 0:26:45.840 --> 0:26:48.679 for you, Tell a doc gives you access to a 0:26:48.760 --> 0:26:52.280 licensed therapist to help you get back to feeling your best. 0:26:52.960 --> 0:26:56.760 Speak to a licensed therapist by phone or video anytime 0:26:56.840 --> 0:27:00.560 between seven am to nine pm local time, seven days 0:27:00.560 --> 0:27:05.080 a week. Teledoc Therapy is available through most insurance or employers. 0:27:05.840 --> 0:27:09.399 Download the app or visit teledoc dot com. Forward slash 0:27:09.480 --> 0:27:16.040 Unexplained Podcast Today to get started. That's teladoc dot com 0:27:16.080 --> 0:27:17.720 Slash Unexplained Podcast