📷 Image: Wikimedia Commons / Jaggery
Politics
Senedd Urges Action on Abandoned Coal Tips as Wales Reflects on Aberfan Tragedy
✍️ Caerphilly Observer
🗓 22 Oct 2026, 03:49 AM
👁 11
The Welsh Parliament has called for urgent measures to address disused coal tips amid a national remembrance of the 1966 Aberfan disaster.
The Senedd, Wales’ devolved parliament, today urged the Welsh Government to take immediate action on disused coal tips across the country.
Disused coal tips, or spoil heaps, are piles of waste material left after mining operations ceased. They can become unstable and pose a risk of collapse, especially during heavy rainfall.
The call came as Wales marked the 57th anniversary of the Aberfan disaster, when a collapsed coal tip buried a school and a church, killing 144 people, most of them children.
Parliamentarians said the government should conduct a comprehensive survey, strengthen monitoring and, where necessary, remove or stabilise the most hazardous tips to prevent future tragedies.
Disused coal tips, or spoil heaps, are piles of waste material left after mining operations ceased. They can become unstable and pose a risk of collapse, especially during heavy rainfall.
The call came as Wales marked the 57th anniversary of the Aberfan disaster, when a collapsed coal tip buried a school and a church, killing 144 people, most of them children.
Parliamentarians said the government should conduct a comprehensive survey, strengthen monitoring and, where necessary, remove or stabilise the most hazardous tips to prevent future tragedies.