Hibakusha (atomic bomb survivor) who advocates for nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation.
By the spring of 1945, many of Hiroshima’s children had been ordered to leave the city for their safety. Some went to live with relatives in the countryside, while others were taken by their teachers to rural schools or temples. Reiko Yamada was eleven years old at the time and one of the children who had remained in Hiroshima. She was scheduled to move to a temple with other students on August 9. But on August 6, everything changed.
That morning, the summer sun was already blazing. Around 8 a.m., Reiko and her classmates gathered in the schoolyard for a flag-signaling drill. Food was scarce during the war, and the children were poorly nourished. Several became so weak that they fainted in the intense heat. Eventually, the students were allowed to seek shade beneath the trees.
As they rested, one of the students noticed an American B-29 bomber flying high above the city. Aircraft had become a familiar sight to the children, so they did not immediately recognize the danger.
Reiko describes what happened*:
I sat at the edge of a sandbox. Then, a sixth grade boy pointed up to a B29. Standing in the courtyard, he said, almost like singing, ‘It’s a B29,’ and we all looked up at the shiny, beautiful B29. It made a U-turn and left a beautiful, white tail wind.
Suddenly, an intense flash of light blinded all of us. So, we rushed to the air raid shelter. At that moment, a hot blast, with sand rushed right into my back and I fell over. When I reached the shelter, I couldn’t enter, because there were too many adults in it already.
Right then, rain that was black, later we heard that it was called black rain, started, and we were all drenched. And even though it was in the middle of summer, we were all extremely cold.
When the Enola Gay B-29 dropped Little Boy, a 10,000-pound uranium bomb that detonated approximately above Hiroshima, 80,000 to 140,000 people were instantly killed and 100,000 more were seriously injured.
The firestorm resulting from the blast generated enormous quantities of ash, which were carried into the atmosphere. The ash helped to “seed” the clouds, contributing to the formation of what became known as “black rain.” This dark precipitation—described as having an almost tar-like consistency—consisted of water mixed with ash and radioactive fallout. In some cases, exposure to the black rain resulted in severe radiation burns.
Reiko’s home was 2.6 kilometers from the bomb’s hypocenter, and most of the houses nearby were destroyed by the blast. Her father had been about one kilometer from the explosion. Trapped beneath a collapsed building, he was eventually rescued and managed to make his way home, his body covered in wounds from shattered glass. Her eldest sister had been at Hiroshima railway station, about 1.5 kilometers from the hypocenter. She returned home two days later with severe burns across her neck and back.
There was almost no medicine available. Reiko’s mother tried to cool her daughter’s burns with thin slices of cucumber, but the intense heat caused them to spoil quickly. Flies gathered around the wounds, and the family took turns fanning her to keep them away. Unable to sleep because of the excruciating pain, she endured suffering that revealed just how impossible even basic medical care had become in the aftermath of the bombing.
Reiko’s thirteen-year-old sister survived because she had been ill and stayed home that day. Most of her classmates were not so fortunate. They had been sent to work near the city center, where they helped demolish buildings to create firebreaks and prevent fires from spreading. Many were killed. Throughout the neighborhood, hardly a family was left untouched: almost every household had lost someone or had a relative who was injured, badly burned, or missing.
As Reiko describes:
Our area, the school and town, did not burn down completely. So, people closer to the hypocenter ran towards our town for safety. Many were severely burned and injured. Some didn’t even look human anymore.
Roads overflowed with people running for safety. At first, we thought it was just our school, but soon, we knew something horrendous had happened… At night the sky was red, and we feared the fire reaching us. In the daytime, I was scared due to the screams of those in pain and agony.
By the third day, the dead were being brought to the playground of her school. Bodies were placed into ditches and cremated one after another. The smell of burning bodies filled the town. A place that had once been filled with children learning and playing had become a place where the dead were burned.
The suffering continued even after Japan surrendered on August 15. Food remained scarce, and the following spring, students planted sweet potatoes in the schoolyard. When they harvested them, they discovered human bones in the ground. The children were horrified and could not eat the potatoes.
The bombing left Reiko and other survivors with memories that could never be erased. They had witnessed the deaths of family members, friends, classmates, and neighbors, and watched their city disappear in a matter of seconds. Many survivors also endured lasting physical effects from radiation, as well as the emotional burden of remembering those they had lost and those they were unable to save.
Reiko’s experience shows that the consequences of a nuclear weapon extend far beyond the moment of the explosion. Hiroshima was not simply a city reduced to ruins; it was a community of families, children, schools, and ordinary people whose lives were forever changed.
Reiko’s message:
Never forget, especially never forget the facts of the war. Nuclear weapons are weapons of mass destruction. Many people today don’t know anything about war. I hope that the youth never forget, that they will learn what happened. There are clear facts – nothing made up – facts. So, please take the time to learn so that history will not repeat itself.
* The quotes above came from a 2013 interview with Reiko Yamada at the Manhattan Neighborhood Network.