Clydach Vale
Coordinates: 51 ° 37 ′ 30 " N , 3 ° 28 ′ 48" W.
The Clydach Vale Reservoir is or was a reservoir in a side valley of the River Rhondda in Glamorganshire , Wales , United Kingdom. It belonged to an abandoned coal mine. In 1910, a dam broke here, killing up to eight people.
The misfortune
At 4 p.m. on March 11, 1910, the dam broke and caused a tidal wave of water, mud and stones in the town of Clydach Vale, which according to various sources killed six or eight people. Most of them were children. Many were also saved, including more than 900 children from the Clydach Vale School. They were taken to safety over a wall at the playground and through the windows of the building outside. Many miners who had just finished their shifts helped. Three of the schoolchildren were killed (Blodwen Davies, nine years, Enid Howells, six years and Gertrude Rees, five years). There were other deaths on Adams Street with Elizabeth Ann Williams, her ten-week-old daughter Francis and Haydn Brimble.
Eleven houses and a shoemaker's shop were destroyed. The flood also carried large blocks of stone all the way to the railway line that connects the Rhondda Valley to Swansea through the Blaengwynte Tunnel . Railway traffic was interrupted for hours. The tidal wave then poured into the Rhondda, a tributary of the River Taff .
In 2010, a hundred years later, a plaque was posted at the school with the names of the victims.
swell
- DJ Carpenter: Clydach Vale Flood Disaster 1910, 1995
Individual evidence
- ↑ Rhondda valley dams bursts. Eight lives lost
- ↑ DISASTER IN WALES. Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 13680, 14 March 1910, Page 7
- ↑ Clydach Vale history, Rhondda Cynon Taf Library collection ( Memento of the original from February 19, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
See also
Web links
- Lessons from historical dam incidents PDF file 2962 kB, accessed on July 19, 2014
- Clydach Vale Floods / Llifogydd Cwmclydach (Flickr Photos) , accessed July 19, 2014
- Rhondda Cynon Taf Library Service, The Clydach Vale Flood Disaster , accessed July 19, 2014