[4] The incident happened at the 'Gorky' drift mine, with ninety men and boys taking the spake, an open-sided trolley fitted with cross planks for seating and a central overhead handrail as a holding point, down to the workings 525 yards below.

The surface engineman suffered a temporary blackout and the manual brake was disengaged, causing the spake to quickly build up speed.

At about 4.00 p.m. on Friday 11 March 1910, the lives of one adult and five children were lost when pent-up water from an abandoned coal mine burst through into the village.

The mountainside seemed to give way, 'as though from a volcanic eruption' and a torrent of water together with huge amounts of earth, boulders and other debris swept down the hillside.

Directly in the path of this torrent lay Adams Terrace and, according to contemporary newspaper reports, the first house it encountered 'was in a moment completely wrecked like a pack of cards' and its occupants Mrs. Elizabeth Ann Williams and her ten-week-old baby girl perished.

The time coincided with the homecoming of many miners at the ending of a shift and an immediate rescue effort by them and the school's staff saved all but three of over 950 children.

[2][5] In particular, headmaster Robert Ralph Williams displayed extraordinary bravery in battling the flood and saving many children, for which he was later awarded the Albert Medal.

In preparation for the 2010 centenary of the disaster, another plaque, with names of the dead, was installed at the school together with a montage of photographs showing the aftermath of the flood.

[8] Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council had its main offices in the community, at The Pavilions on the Cambrian Industrial Park from 1996 until early 2024.

Impacts on landscape and society of a century of coal mining are not fully obliterated, though surrounding slagheaps have been greened by environmental programmes.