Eerie photographs show a forgotten village abandoned 50 years ago for fear of landslides.
The tiny village of Pantyffynnon was deserted amid fears whole families could be buried under landslides.
Today shops, houses and a church appear frozen in the 1960s when villagers were evacuated because the mountain in the Swansea Valley was moving.
Eerie photographs show a forgotten village abandoned 50 years ago for fear of landslides
Today the houses, shops and church at the heart of the community remains deserted as its former residents fled elsewhere. Pictured above, a former chocolate shop frozen in time
The tiny village of Pantyffynnon was deserted because of fears whole families could be buried under landslides. Pictured above, an overgrown fireplace in a ruined home
Pictured: A vintage postcard showing the busting village in the early 1900s
The former community bustling with houses, shops and a church, were all emptied and the village is now not even shown on Google maps, as though it never existed.
Former residents say they no longer recognise the place they once called home as it is overgrown and neglected.
Rosalyn Davies, 69, who grew up in the village, said: ‘There was a whole community here; this was my home and always will be my home. There must have been around 100 houses lost in all.’
Hundreds of villagers were evacuated in the 1960s because the mountain in the Swansea Valley was moving. Pictured above, a home which hasn’t changed since the 1960s
Former residents say they no longer recognise the place they once called home as it is overgrown and neglected
Pictured: Councillor Rosalyn Davies who was a resident of the village stands on a road which was once bustling with life
She said: ‘It’s an awful thing; you not only lose a house, you lose a home. I had happy times here; it was a fabulous place to grow up as a child.
‘When I walk along today memories come flooding back but at least they are happy memories. It is also very sad as well. We lost a community. People scattered.
‘Today it’s a ghost village; It’s quite eerie, as I remember it as it was. It’s sad, so very sad. It was a very happy community. Very close-knitted.
Rosalyn remembers a landslip which careered into one of her neighbours’ houses.
Pictured: A vintage picture of the village from the early 1900’s
Pictured: Former resident Gareth Roderick, 79, said: ‘There was a quarry and a spring on the hillside behind the house a few doors away and the pipes became blocked and the water came down’
Pictured: Rosalyn Davies, 69, who grew up in the village, said: ‘There was a whole community here; this was my home and always will be my home. There must have been around 100 houses lost in all’
‘We were lucky’: Former residents remember when homes collapsed, above
She said: ‘I can remember hearing a noise and walking out the front door and seeing a double decker bus reversing back down the hill and all the mud was coming to meet it.
‘We were fortunate that we didn’t have a gate in the wall at the back of our garden, next door wasn’t so lucky and it went right through the house.
‘It took a long time to clean it all up; the road was closed for quite a while.’
Buildings in the village were demolished as a result of the landslide and the area was closed off.
Luckily nobody was killed, but the remains of some deserted homes and communal buildings are still standing.
Buildings in the village were demolished as a result of the landslide and the area was closed off
Luckily nobody was killed, but the remains of some deserted homes and communal buildings are still standing. Pictured above, a home destroyed in the landslide
Pantyffynon was on the main highway between Swansea and mid Wales market town Brecon. Where proud homes once stood, in parts are now little more than ruins
Former resident Mr Roderick recalls the time the mountain began to shake. He said: ‘It came very quietly. It had been squeezing against the house all morning. There was no noise at all. It then came down over the road’
Pantyffynon was also on the main highway between Swansea and mid Wales market town Brecon.
Another former resident Gareth Roderick, 79, said: ‘There was a quarry and a spring on the hillside behind the house a few doors away and the pipes became blocked and the water came down.
‘It caused the mountain to come down and it pushed the house over. It came very quietly. It had been squeezing against the house all morning. There was no noise at all. It then came down over the road.
‘There was a lorry parked outside moving the furniture out and that was buried.
‘I wasn’t scared; I have lived here all my life and knew what was going on. There was a family living next door to us who had only been here a few months and they scarpered.’