dangers underground. Automatic gas monitoring systems are discreetly positioned around the tunnels, as are emergency telephone systems. Some safety beams were monitored around the area. Popular culture The cover of the Manic Street Preachers album National Treasures – The Complete Singles shows the Big Pit winding tower. Historian Gwyn A. Williams used the Big Pit as a setting for one of his programmes in his Channel 4 series The Dragon Has Two Tongues, broadcast in January 1985 - near the end of the miners' strike and as men were returning to work. In it, Williams said "Today it looks to me as if the Welsh people have been declared redundant, as redundant as this pit which after 200 years is now a museum. This is a museum. Wales is being turned into a land of museums!" See also Mining in Wales Mining accident South Wales coalfield South Wales Coalfield Collection 1926 United Kingdom general strike UK miners' strike (1984–85) Rhondda Heritage Park National Coal Mining Museum for England Rhymney Blaenavon Blaenavon Industrial Landscape Notes References External links Official website of Big Pit National Coal Museum European Route of Industrial Heritage – Big Pit National Coal Museum Big Pit @ Welsh Coalmines BBC Wales Coal House on Coal history European Route of Industrial Heritage Anchor Points National museums of Wales Collieries in South Wales Mining museums in Wales Museums in Torfaen Underground mines in Wales Coal museums Blaenavon