In memory

[NutmegCT]

August 6 1945
August 9 1945

 

[YakkoWarner]

Hopefully weapons of that magnitude will never be used again!

 

[waltesefalcon]

A former student visited Hiroshima last month and sent me this one. She said it is quite the somber experience. For those not in the know, the dome you can see under the arch is the ruon of the Hiroshima Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall, or Genbaku Dome. Besides Tibbets, only his co-pilot and bombadier knew what they carried aboard Enola Gay, the rest of the crew were only told to expect a blinding light and were given goggles to wear. Little Boy detonated almost directly above the dome, at 08:15; with the blast wave hitting it from above and it's earthquake resistant design transmitting the blast force to the ground is why the building retained its shape. Everyone inside the building died instantly. Between 70,000 and 80,000 died from the blast and eventually the death toll would become somewhere between 150,000 and 225,000 as more and more died from radiation exposure and cancer over the decades following the bomb.

 

[NutmegCT]

John Hersey's "Hiroshima", The New Yorker, 1946.

Hiroshima

A hundred thousand people were killed by the atomic bomb. Survivors wonder why they lived when so many others died.

www.newyorker.com

 

[waltesefalcon]

John Hersey's "Hiroshima", The New Yorker, 1946.

Hiroshima

A hundred thousand people were killed by the atomic bomb. Survivors wonder why they lived when so many others died.

www.newyorker.com

An excellent book, I highly recommend it.

 

[3798j]

...Besides Tibbets, only his co-pilot and bombadier knew what they carried aboard Enola Gay...