Nagasaki recalls terror-bomb attack

Press, 10 August 1985, Page 10

Nagasaki recalls terror-bomb attack

NZPA-Reuter Nagasaki To howling whistles, tolling bells, and blaring sirens, people in the Japanese port city of Nagasaki stopped yesterday for a minute’s prayer to mark the fortieth anniversary of the atomic bomb attack that killed or wounded half its population at the end of World War 11. Ships whistled, Christian churches and Buddhist temples sounded their bells, and public sirens went off at 11.02 a.m. when, on August 9, 1945 an American Super Fortress bomber dropped a plutonium bomb nicknamed “Fatman.” About 70,000 people died

instantly and another 70,000 were wounded out of a 270,000 population. The Mayor, Mr Hitoshi Motoshima, told 24,000 people gathered in the rain yesterday, “Heat-rays exceeding 3000 deg instantly carbonised the victims’ bodies.” A mushroom cloud burned high up into the midday sky, plunging the ravaged city below into darkness. “More than 70,000 burned and mangled victims lay dead or dying in the ruins. A naked man burned beyond recognition stumbled along trying to escape from the

fires; a blood-spattered child dragged the corpse of his father through the rubble; a gasping young mother trudged away with the headless body of a baby held tightly in her arms. “Since that day, enormous numbers of survivors have died from the after-effects of radioactive poisoning, and still others continue to live in bitter solitude, robbed for ever of human happiness and trembling in fear of death. “The top leaders of the United States and the Soviet Union are scheduled to sit together at nuclear disarmament negotiations in

Geneva this autumn. “It is my fervent hope that they will make this fortieth anniversary of the atomic bombings a joyful year, in which the dark post-war history of the nuclear race makes a sharp turnabout.” After he read the declaration 500 doves were set free. The president of the Committee of Atomic Bomb Survivors in the United States, Kanji Kuramoto, of Alkameda, Claifornia, placed a wreath at the monument. Mr Kuramoto, aged 59, was exposed to radiation in the atomic attack on Hiro-

shima three days before the Nagasaki bombing. He represented yestesrday about 1000 American citizens of Japanese extraction who were in Hiroshima and Nagasaki then.

Among those attending the solemn, 50-minute ceremony were 65 mayors from communities in 22 foreign countries, including the five atomic Powers.

Primary and junior high school pupils throughout the city interrupted their summer holidays to attend classes on what happened 40 years ago. At the Urakami Catholic Church about 1000 followers

prayed for world peace and for the repose of souls of the victims. The church stood near the epicentre of the atomic blast. It was rebuilt after the war.