Damien Mooney has crowbars and even a chainsaw on hand - as he never knows when he'll be called into action to deal with a car crash on his doorstep.
Over the last two weeks, there have been at least three road accidents in the same spot on a rural road. The half a mile stretch is so prolific for incidents, Damien is never surprised when there's another one and, because of where he lives, he's often first on the scene.
“Where we live, we don’t have many neighbours, and put it this way, the people we see the most are delivery drivers, or people who have crashed,” said Damien. “When we moved in, around 2019, within a week of moving in, there was a young lad who came to the front door, he had put his car on the roof in the stream, he was soaked.
"A couple of years later I took a chainsaw out to help a lady who was stuck in her car. I always try and go out to help as I know we are far from places. We have had many knocks on the door since being here." You can read more stories from the Rhondda Cynon Taf area here.
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The road Damien refers to is the A4093, between Gilfach Goch and Glynogwr, bordering on the Rhondda Cynon Taf and Bridgend council lines. It is known by local residents as Blackmill lanes, with a large part of the windy road restricted by a 60mph speed limit. At the beginning of this month, on October 6, a serious accident closed the road for several hours. Three people were taken to hospital with injuries, and an 18-year-old man remains in hospital in a critical condition. The road was also closed for a short while on October 15 following an incident.
Damien's house is directly on the corner where a lot of these incidents occur. Talking about the serious crash, Damien said he heard a loud bang and his dogs responded to the commotion outside so he rushed out. He said: "There were around five people, one of them a nurse, that were there helping, I don't know what would have happened if it wasn't for them."
Listing the most recent incidents he could recall, Damien was able to count up to nine road traffic collisions in the past three months over just a half mile distance. "They all end up in the same place," he said, "It is either in the field opposite us, or the hedge or the stream, and I worry about the stream as it floods several times a year, I worry that one day someone will end up in there and me and my partner will try to help and something will happen.
"The last two months, I don't know what has happened, I couldn't tell you what causes it. It isn't always people coming around fast, I don't know what has happened."
Another of Damien's concerns was the livestock kept in the fields where the cars often ended up. He said cars often damaged the fencing and he knew of an incident a number of years ago where a horse got loose and was killed on the road as a result. "
The road used to be limited to 30mph, but Damien didn't think the increase to 60mph was necessarily to blame, or cars being driven too fast. "I really couldn't tell you what is causing it. And it is not all youngsters, it's anyone it is happening to. I've helped a school teacher on her way to school in the morning, a plumber, an old boy, and I would say about 85% of the time it is just one vehicle."
Anyone who knows the road knows how very difficult it would be to drive along the windy stretch doing the maximum 60mph speed limit. Gilfach Goch resident Julie Jenkins, said: "I use this road and it is one of the most dangerous roads I've travelled on. Like my dad always said the road was built for horses and carts not for buses and lorries. It should be 20 mile an hour or they need to invest in widening it. I've lived in Gilfach all my life and there has been a lot of accidents on this road."
Another resident also said they urged people using the road to employ common sense. Kathryn Preddy said: "I moved to the area almost a year and a half ago and if any of my family or friends are driving from Gilfach to Blackmill I ask them to use their common sense, not the speed limit. 60 miles an hour on a road that narrow, with that many blind bends, mixed with the dark nights and wet weather drawing in, it’s a recipe for disaster. I really don’t like it at all."
There was an incident more recently on the same road but away from the windy lanes near Hendreforgan Primary school. A spokesperson for South Wales Police said: "Shortly before 6.40am on Friday 14th October South Wales Police was called to a road traffic collision on the same road which involved a car and a truck near Gilfach Goch fire station. Both drivers, a 60 year-old local man and a 29 year-old man from Tonypandy were taken to hospital where they were treated for non-life-threatening injuries. The cause of the collision remains under investigation."
While it's unknown if speed was a factor in this particular incident, the issue of the speed limit on the A4093, which is near a school, is a problem for some people. Just before the road enters Gilfach Goch and passes the school, the limit does drop to 30mph. The proximity of the school to the windy and fast road is a concern for some people.
Resident Mair Barnes told us: "I would probably say that the stretch of road from just before Hendreforgan to past the bridge should at the very least be a restricted speed limit, not only because of, as you say, many RTAs, but because of the school. Many schools I've seen have speed bumps outside on the roads and rightly so. I think as this is the way everyone will travel to Bridgend it's an extremely busy road. I'm not saying for one minute that all accidents are caused by speed but because of the school alone there should be something more stringent in place."
Regarding the most recent incident, a spokesperson for South Wales Police said: "At around 10.10am on Saturday October 15 th , emergency services responded to a report of a road traffic collision which involved two cars on the A4093 in Hendreforgan. A 56-year-old man from Tonypandy was taken to the Princess of Wales Hospital, Bridgend, where he is being treated for non-life-threatening injuries. The cause of the collision remains under investigation."
He added: "The 18 year-old man injured in the collision on October 6 remains in hospital in a critical condition."
According to CrashMap there have been 13 incidents on this stretch of road between Blackmill and Gilfach Goch between 2016 and 2021. However this data only relates to personal injury collisions which have been reported to the police.
A spokesperson for Rhondda Cynon Taf Council said: “The council is aware of the recent traffic incident and the subsequent concerns raised by the local community. Where there are cross-boundary responsibilities in relation to roads, neighbouring local authorities will work closely together to ensure a consistent approach is applied in conjunction with South Wales Police, which covers the entire route and has responsibility for policing speed limits.”
Bridgend County Borough Council has also been approached for comment.
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