Nagasaki Atomic Bomb Museum - Never Again (Part1)
August 7th, 2018
Even though the museum's sole focus is to preserve the memory of that horrific day it was a place I felt I needed to visit.
It was a scorching hot day, driving over the mountainous region between Fukuoka and Nagasaki we pulled into a rest stop that flanked an inviting river. Running past the ubiquitous vending machines we hurried to the edge of the river, kicked off our shoes and plunged our feet into the rushing water.
It was probably around 40 C but this is nothing compared to the heat experienced 73 years earlier at Nagasaki.
This was my first time visiting Nagasaki and as we pulled up to the museum I felt an unmistakable sense of sorrow. It was subtle, not overwhelming, but it was there. Dark memories, a part of the land that lingered on through the decades and palpable in the streets. Ever present.
The museum itself, or what I thought was the museum, was a square, faded red brick building nestled on a slope near the city center and the Urakami River. As it turned out, the museum was located underground and I never found out what was housed in the brick building exactly, but it certainly added to a feeling of foreboding. Or at least that's how it felt to me at the time. The pictures i found of the building online later seemed much nicer.
I can't say that I know for sure why I was compelled to go there. To be completely honest there was some sort of morbid fascination with death and destruction to be sure but mostly I wanted to understand the event from the Japanese perspective.
There's no escaping the fact that the museum is heavy with horrors, sorrow and despair. Nevertheless, and it sounds crazy to say this, but this was probably my favorite museum I've ever visited.
I found the whole experience endlessly engrossing and moving. We spent nearly 3 hours at the museum but I could have stayed there all day. There's so much to take in at the exhibit that I can only hope to relate a fraction of what I absorbed.
August 9th, 1945
Hiroshima was was the first city ever to suffer the catostrophic destruction delivered by a nuclear weapon. On August 6th, 1945, a device name "Little Boy" was dropped over Hiroshima and just 3 days later a more powerful bomb named "Fat Man" detonated over Nagasaki.
US Targeting of Japanese Cities
Tokyo Bay
Kawasaki
Yokohama
Nogoya
Osaka
Kobe
Kyoto
Kure
Yahata
Hiroshima
Kokura
Shimonoseki
Yamaguchi
Kumamoto
Fukuoka
Nagasaki
Sasebo
Nagasaki - 11:02 AM
Several clocks comemmorate the exact minute the bomb exploded over the unsuspecting city.
- 10:58 AM the skies break and the crew of the B-29 Bomber "Bock's Car" releases "Fat Man"
- 11:02 AM "Fat Man" detonates at 1,840 feet above Nagasaki
- 500 feet off target from 2 large Mitsubishi war plants
- Estimated force of 22,000 tons of TNT
- A massive fireball and mushroom cloud billow up to 60,000 feet
- The Heat from the blast reached temperatures of nearly 4,000 C / 7,000 F
Total Destruction
According to the Museum
Population: 240,000
74,000 people instantly vaporized (at 1.6 km radius of the hypocenter)
75,000 injuries related to heat, radiation, blast injuries, and fires
(up to the end of Dec. 1945)
Of course, these are the best estimates according to Japanese Authorities and the Committee for the Preservation of Atomic Bomb Artifacts
(1950)
August 15th 1945 - Japan surrenders - the War is Over
Nagasaki - Before and After
National Geographic
gfycat.com
Fat Man
Fat Man and Little Boy were secretly prepared and assembled in Tinian Island, part of the Mariana Islands in the South Pacific that includes Guam and Saipan. As part of the Manhaten project the United States had already successfully detonated nuclear prototypes in the desert of New Mexico in what was known as the Trinity tests.
Fat Man was a more complex bomb than Little Boy and the military was eager to see how it would 'perform'. Fat man was designed with a neutron initiator at its core surrounded by plutonium 239. By contrast, Little Boy was a Uranium 235 device armed with a conventional charge and detonator.
skytamer.com
Today's Nukes
By today's standards the bombs that decimated Hiroshima and Nagasaki appear minuscule compared to later iterations of nuclear devices such as the Russian Tzar 50,000 Kiloton monster. But when we consider the scale of destruction left by both "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" it is almost impossible to comprehend the catastrophic power of modern nuclear warfare.
In Part II, we'll discuss the human toll and stories from the survivors of Nagasaki. It's one thing to see how a single bomb could almost completely wipe city right off the map but to hear the stories of the survivors and the images captured from the bomb's aftermath is heart-wrenching.
Thanks for Reading.
Additional References
http://www.hiroshima-remembered.com/history/nagasaki/
74,000 people instantly vaporized (at 1.6 km radius of the hypocenter)
75,000 injuries related to heat, radiation, blast injuries, and fires
(1950)
August 15th 1945 - Japan surrenders - the War is Over
Nagasaki - Before and After
Fat Man
Fat Man was a more complex bomb than Little Boy and the military was eager to see how it would 'perform'. Fat man was designed with a neutron initiator at its core surrounded by plutonium 239. By contrast, Little Boy was a Uranium 235 device armed with a conventional charge and detonator.
Today's Nukes
By today's standards the bombs that decimated Hiroshima and Nagasaki appear minuscule compared to later iterations of nuclear devices such as the Russian Tzar 50,000 Kiloton monster. But when we consider the scale of destruction left by both "Little Boy" and "Fat Man" it is almost impossible to comprehend the catastrophic power of modern nuclear warfare.
In Part II, we'll discuss the human toll and stories from the survivors of Nagasaki. It's one thing to see how a single bomb could almost completely wipe city right off the map but to hear the stories of the survivors and the images captured from the bomb's aftermath is heart-wrenching.
Thanks for Reading.
Additional References
http://www.hiroshima-remembered.com/history/nagasaki/
Thanks for Reading.
Additional References
Fascinating. So informative. I had no idea that Nagasaki was not supposed to be targeted. It’s amazing for date can change due to a cloudy day over Kokura.
Hey, thanks for commenting!
Yeah, I was floored to know that Nagasaki wasn't the main target on that day. How unfortunate for the people of Nagasaki, and how August 9th 1945 could have been a nightmare for those in Kokura! The B-29 bomber Bock's Car had so many problems on that day as well, it's also an interesting part of the story if you get a chance to click the link at the bottom of the post.