After Christmas, comes Boxing Day; a day when, as a child, I used to get to play with some of the new toys I’d been given the day before. It was a day, too, when we’d visit family; most often my grandparents.
I wonder though, do you recall Boxing Day 2004?
Boxing Day 2004, was the day we woke up to hear news of the Indian Ocean tsunami. This was a natural disaster which led to the loss of at least 250,000 lives across 14 countries. To put it more dramatically, over a quarter of a million people were killed that day.
Some of us may also recall the Hillsborough disaster of 1989. That was a man-made tragedy which led to the loss of life for 96 innocent sports fans who had gone that day simply to enjoy a football match. It was a tragedy made all the worse for taking nearly 30 years to reveal the cause, and cover-up, of the event.
I mention these two events as they were disasters that, in a very small way, affected me. One of the countries badly hit in 2004 had been Sri Lanka; a country I had visited only a couple of years previously. In common with the 96 people who lost their lives at Hillsborough, I am a Liverpool fan.
I am sure that each of us, if we took time, could find disasters with which we could associate ourselves either directly or indirectly. I wonder though, could you identify the very first such disaster and recognise what effect it had upon you?
The first disaster I ever became aware of was Aberfan. This was a combined man-made and natural disaster which occurred on 21st October 1966. Aberfan was, is, a small village in the coal-mining area of the South Wales valleys. One consequence of deep shaft coal mining, is slag (unwanted soil and dust), this has to be piled up near the mines and is, was, often left in piles as tall as hills. At least one of these slag heaps, as they were called, dominated the skyline above the village of Aberfan.
That October it rained in South Wales, it rained a lot. That, as any Welshmann will tell you, is not unusual. If you live and grow up in the area, you get used to it and you prepare for it, in fact, you often make jokes about it. It is a fact of life in the area. A fact, though, that the coal board had ignored. The coal board was responsible for the slag heaps that dominated the landscape as a result of the mining activities.
The rain falling on the slag heaps, loosened the spoil and turned it into a form of slurry. This caused the side of the slag heap to move, to slide. It loosened and slid down onto the village. Within minutes, the village was covered in the slag. At the centre of the slide, was the village primary school where the school children had just sat down for lessons. The school was covered and destroyed by the flow. In all, 116 children and 28 adults were killed by the event.
We, as human beings, are vulnerable creatures; made of flesh and bone and blood. We have no natural defence against fire or flood or any weight crushing down on us.
Yet, we not only survive in this world, we thrive here.
We thrive because we are not merely individuals, we are also social nbeings who live and work in unison with others. We use our skills, our experiences and our intelligence to create shelters, such as houses, to protect and secure us from known potential threats, such as cold and wet and all but the most extreme of weather.
Yet disasters happen.
As I say, the first disaster I recall was Aberfan.
I recall it not becauase I had been there, not because I was involved in it … I wasn’t. It was the first such disaster that I recall watching on the television news.
As I watched the grainy black and white images on the screen, I recall my mother saying “Look at the people helping …”. My mind was drawn to the people, everyday people, digging and clearing the debris as they searched for survivors.
I do not know what made my mother say that. Perhaps it was something she had heard, perhaps her mother had said it to her. Maybe it was just her attempt to draw my young mind away from the sad aspects of the tragedy and focus upon the hope and determination of those ordinary people.
Her words have stayed with me and each time I see television reports of some disaster, I look for the people helping.
It is the ways in which we feel it is important to help other people, not just in the face of disaster but also in everyday society, which will ensure that we continue to thrive in our world.
