75 years on, the horror of Hiroshima and Nagasaki's atomic bombing

2020 marks 75 years since the United States unleashed the world's first atomic bomb attack on the city of Hiroshima, followed three days later by the second and last on Nagasaki, vapourising lives, buildings and Japan's capacity for war. Japan invaded and occupied parts of Asia before and during the war in the name of its emperor, Hirohito, and aligned itself with Germany and Italy in 1940 to become one of the so-called Axis powers. Japan surrendered on Aug. 15, 1945, bringing World War II to an end.The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki capped six years of top-secret work by scientists from Europe and North America.Following are some facts about the bombing of the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

At 8:15 a.m. on Aug. 6, 1945, an American B-29 Superfortress bomber Enola Gay dropped a 10,000-pound uranium 235 bomb on Hiroshima, instantly killing about 78,000 people. By the end of 1945, the number of dead had reached about 140,000 out of an estimated population of 350,000. Credit: Reuters

The bomb, nicknamed “Little Boy,” exploded about 600 metres above the centre of the city, setting off a surge of heat reaching 4,000 degrees Celsius across a radius of about 4.5 km. Credit: Reuters

Three days later, at 11:02 a.m. on Aug. 9, 1945, the United States dropped a 10,000-pound plutonium-239 bomb, nicknamed “Fat Man”, on Nagasaki. Credit: Reuters

It exploded about 500 metres above the ground, instantly killing about 27,000 of the city’s estimated population of around 200,000. By the end of 1945, the number of dead due to acute radiation exposure reached about 70,000. Credit: Reuters

Japan has so far recognised the total number of victims who died of radiation illness and injuries in Hiroshima as 253,008 and in Nagasaki as 143,124. Credit: Reuters

Apart from this, last year the city of Hiroshima added for the first time the words “Many Unknown” to the ledger of the victims’ names placed in a container at the cenotaph of the Peace Memorial Park. Credit: Reuters

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