Lists of nearly 520,000 Hiroshima, Nagasaki A-bomb victims aired out to remove moisture

The lists of victims of the 1945 atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki were aired out to remove moisture in the respective cities on May 18.

Employees at western Japan's Hiroshima Municipal Government observed a moment of silence at 8:15 a.m. -- the time the bomb was dropped on the city on Aug. 6, 1945 -- and took out 122 volumes of the lists from a stone chamber of the cenotaph for A-bomb victims at Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park in the city's Naka Ward. They then checked each page to make sure they were not damaged.

In the lists are the names of 328,929 people whose deaths had been confirmed by Aug. 5, 2021, and their information including the dates of their deaths. Two volumes of lists have been added since the airing out event in May 2021 as the deaths of 4,800 people were newly confirmed. One of the 122 volumes of notes covers "numerous people whose names are unknown." In another volume are the names of 12 people who had been exposed to the separate atomic bombing in the city of Nagasaki and whose families wished for their names to be listed in Hiroshima for reasons including the victims moving to Hiroshima.

When the lists were aired out in 2020 and 2021, the Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum was closed amid the coronavirus pandemic, but this year the museum was open as usual. People including students on school trips who visited the museum and the cenotaph observed the airing process.

A similar event was also held at the Nagasaki National Peace Memorial Hall for Atomic Bomb Victims in the southwestern Japan city of Nagasaki.

Eleven employees at the Nagasaki Municipal Government observed a moment of silence at 11:02 a.m. -- the time the U.S. military dropped the bomb on Nagasaki on Aug. 9, 1945 -- and turned the pages of the lists to check them.

The names of 189,245 people whose deaths had been confirmed by the city by the end of July 2021 are listed in 194 volumes. One volume contains the names of 82 people who had been exposed to the bombing in Hiroshima and wished to be listed under Nagasaki. There is also a blank volume for victims who died immediately after the bombing and whose names remain unknown.

The work to add the names of victims whose deaths have been confirmed since August 2021 will start on June 1, and the lists will be enshrined during a peace ceremony on Aug. 9 to mark the 77th anniversary of the bombing of Nagasaki.

(Japanese original by Kiyomasa Nakamura, Hiroshima Bureau, and Hiroyuki Takahashi, Nagasaki Bureau)