The underground gas explosion resulted in a "sacrifice of human life to an extent unparalleled in the history of coal mining of this country"[1]: 141  in which 114 men and boys were killed.

After the explosion, mine owner James Harvey Insole and his officials were accused of "neglecting the commonest precautions for the safety of the men and the safe working of the colliery".

The tragedy highlighted the need for a workable compensation scheme for miners and their dependents to reduce their reliance on public charity after such disasters.

[3][7][8] In his report to the Secretary of State for the year 1856, Mines Inspector Mackworth described the disaster as "the most lamentable and destructive explosion which had ever occurred in any colliery either in this country or abroad".

[2][5] He told the inquest that "the explosion arose from the persons in charge of the pit neglecting the commonest precautions for the safety of the men and the safe working of the colliery".

[2]: 2 The inquest determined that, apart from the collier who died later of burns, all the deaths were the result of "suffocation, caused by the post-explosion effects of afterdamp or methane poisoning".

[2][3][10] At the Glamorgan Spring Assizes held in Swansea in March 1857, the judge, His Lordship Baron Watson, made his own position clear in his pre-trial address to the grand jury.

Thirty graves were opened at the Cymmer Independent Chapel graveyard and the bodies of forty-eight victims were interred on 17 July 1856 in the presence of huge crowds (estimated at 15,000 people).

Smaller numbers of burials occurred in other local communities, with "11 at Tonyrefail, nine at Ffrwd Amos, eight at the Dinas Methodist Chapel, and the rest at Pontypridd, Treforest, Coed Cymmer, Llantrissant, Llanharry, Bedwas, Trelanos, Brynmenyn, Wauntrodau, Llanwonno".

[14] The court's verdict meant the Fatal Accidents Act 1846, which required compensation to be paid only when a mine manager or proprietor was held to have been at fault, did not apply.

The cost of an administration, before an action can be commenced, and the difficulty of obtaining a solicitor who will undertake the odium and the risk, unite in forming an insuperable bar to the claim due to the widow and the fatherless, who, by the neglect or cupidity of others, have been plunged in one moment into the deepest affliction and most abject poverty.

[3]: 160 [14] Insole contributed £500 (approximately equivalent to £59,000 in 2023) to the Cymer Widows' and Orphans' Fund, set up shortly after the disaster, and undertook to meet the cost of the thirty graves.

[3][16] However, local coal owners also combined to deny work to those colliers who had given evidence against the mine officials at the inquest and trial.