Friday 9 August 2019

From Little boy to Fat man


               On August 6, 1945, the Enola gay bomber flew above Hiroshima and dropped Little boy, a Uranium- 235 bomb. The pilot Paul Warfield Tibbets  pressed the button just 1900 feet above the ground, and  Enola gay  turned out to be the first aircraft to drop an atomic bomb.
                      Little Boy was ready for delivery by July 31. On August 2, Hiroshima was specified as the primary target, with Kokura and Nagasaki as alternates. The raid was set for August 6. Kyoto was also in the list but spared as one of US leaders spent honeymoon there!
It was 8.15AM
                         Little boy has 3-metre length and 4400 kg in weight. It took away the lives of more than one lakh people around 13Kms and turned the area to ash. The city, boiled at 2500 degree Centigrade. The half-burnt people rushed in panic and crawled as the city turned to a graveyard.46% people died due to heavy radiation. The bomber turned to a 180° and ran away as fast as it could. The crew could see a bright flash. Shortly after that, the first shock wave hit the plane. It returned to Tinian Island, the base station.
 Three days  later, US again dropped, this time, Fatman  in Nagasaki, the other town in Japan. Boxcar, sometimes called Bock's Car, the United States Army Air Forces B-29 bomber dropped  Fat Man, nuclear weapon over the Japanese city of Nagasaki 

Why Hiroshima?
                          Hiroshima was selected as the main target since it had remained largely intact by bombing raids, and the bomb's special effects could be clearly calculated. It was believed that bombing an urban area might break the fighting will of the Japanese people. Hiroshima was a major port and a military headquarters, and therefore a strategic target. Also, visual bombing, rather than radar, would be used so that photographs of the damage could be taken! Since Hiroshima had not been seriously harmed by bombing raids till then, these photographs could present a quite apparent depiction of the bomb's damage.
Sadako Sasaki affected radiation at the age of two. She was two kilometres away from where the bomb exploded. Most of Sadako's neighbours died, but Sadako wasn't injured at all. But later developed acute leukaemia after being exposed to radiation during the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. There was a belief that making of 1000 paper cranes would get her wishes. In the hospital bed, she could complete 644 only, balance completed by her friends and buried all with her.
                                I had a chance to visit Hiroshima. From my station in Nagoya, it was a long journey passing through Tokyo, by bullet train. Though public transport is excellent service in Japan, it’s also expensive. When I expressed my wish to visit Hiroshima, my host was insensitive and surprised to know that she has never been in there, nor aware of the cause that led to this tragedy. So is the case of many youngsters there. I think Japan has nothing against the other countries they battled in the war and they just want a world of peace.
                                        










                          After, Hiroshima-Nagasaki, nuclear weapons are not used for war. However, there are bombs much stronger than Little boy and Fatman with many countries.
Today is August 9
The Nagasaki day

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