HIROSHIMA: HAUNTING SHADOWS OF PEOPLE KILLED BY THE BLAST

On 6 and 9 August, it will be 75 years since the US dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the final months of World War Two.

The death tolls have always been estimates, but it is thought that about 140,000 of Hiroshima's 350,000 population were killed in the blast, and that at least 74,000 people died in Nagasaki.

The bomb blast in Hiroshima was of such intensity that it permanently burned the shadows of people and objects into the ground. These became known as “Hiroshima shadows”. The haunting impressions were caused by the heat of the explosion, which changed the color of concrete surfaces, scorching them white, leaving an outline of bodies and objects that absorbed some of the blast.

A victim and ladder and a victim with a stick seeking shelter

That shadows around the city lasted for years, until eventually rain and wind began to erode them away. 

Victim who fell at a bridge and the shadow of  a bike

The image above is thought to be the residue of a person who was sitting at the entrance of Hiroshima Branch of Sumitomo Bank when the atomic bomb was dropped over Hiroshima. It is thought that the person depicted in the stone died immediately with the flash of the atomic bomb, or after falling down after the explosion. Some people stated that they saw the person sitting at the entrance just before the bombing. A former soldier testified that he had recovered the person's body. However, the person's identity is still unknown.

The branch reopened after the war, and the entrance soon became a famous landmark of the damage caused by the atomic bombing. It was officially recognized by Hiroshima City as an A-bomb site. Throughout the 1950s the shadow was called "Human Shadow of Death". According to locals, it was the second most famous sight next to the Atomic Bomb Dome. Sumitomo Bank went to great lengths to preserve the shadow. In 1959 they built a fence surrounding the stone, and in 1967 they covered the stone with tempered glass to prevent deterioration. 

In 1971, the bank was rebuilt and the stone around the shadow was cut out and donated to the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum. The shadow had already diminished due to exposure and investigations into preservation methods are ongoing. At present, the stone is surrounded by glass.

On display at the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum

Some people believe that the shadows are outlines of human bodies vaporized immediately after the bombing. However, the possibility of human vaporization is not supported from a medical perspective. The ground surface temperature is thought to have ranged from 3,000 to 4,000 degrees Celsius just after the bombing. Exposing a body to this level of radiant heat would leave bones and carbonized organs behind. While radiation could severely inflame and ulcerate the skin, complete vaporization of the body is impossible.