Hiroshima bomb how many died

The war against Japan in the Pacific, however, continued to rage. President Harry S. Truman , warned by some of his advisers that any attempt to invade Japan would result in horrific American casualties, ordered that the new weapon be used to bring the war to a speedy end. A blast equivalent to the power of 15, tons of TNT reduced four square miles of the city to ruins and immediately killed 80, people. Tens of thousands more died in the following weeks from wounds and radiation poisoning.

Three days later, another bomb was dropped on the city of Nagasaki, killing nearly 40, more people. A few days later, Japan announced its surrender.

In the years since the two atomic bombs were dropped on Japan, a number of historians have suggested that the weapons had a two-pronged objective. First, of course, was to bring the war with Japan to a speedy end and spare American lives. It has been suggested that the second objective was to demonstrate the new weapon of mass destruction to the Soviet Union. The Potsdam Conference between U. Truman, Russian leader Joseph Stalin , and Winston Churchill before being replaced by Clement Attlee ended just four days before the bombing of Hiroshima.

The meeting was marked by recriminations and suspicion between the Americans and Soviets. Russian armies were occupying most of Eastern Europe.

Truman and many of his advisers hoped that the U. In this fashion, the dropping of the atomic bomb on Japan can be seen as the first shot of the Cold War. By , the Soviets had developed their own atomic bomb and the nuclear arms race began. Three days later, the Americans dropped another atomic bomb on the city of Nagasaki at Japanese time. Reiko Hada was nine years old when the bomb exploded in Nagasaki. In an interview with photojournalist Lee Karen Stow , she described her experience: "I made it to the entrance of my house, and I think I even took a step inside, then it happened all of a sudden.

The colours were yellow, khaki and orange, all mixed together. In no time, everything went completely white. The next moment there was a loud roar. Then I blacked out. Hada witnessed some of the catastrophic injuries from the atomic bomb. People with their eyes popped out, their hair dishevelled, almost all naked, badly burned with their skin hanging down. I was asked to give them water, so I found a chipped bowl and went to the nearby river and scooped water to let them drink.

People died one after another. They didn't die like human beings. This is the day when fascism finally dies, as we always knew it would. The following day, Japan's Emperor Hirohito was heard on the radio for the first time ever in a broadcast in which he blamed the use of "a new and most cruel bomb" for Japan's unconditional surrender.

He added: "Should we continue to fight, it would not only result in the ultimate collapse and obliteration of the Japanese nation, but would lead also to the total extinction of human civilisation. He added that special thanks went to the US "without whose prodigious efforts the war in the East would still have many years to run".

It seems almost certain from the various reports that the greatest total number of deaths were those occurring immediately after the bombing. The causes of many of the deaths can only be surmised, and of course many persons near the center of explosion suffered fatal injuries from more than one of the bomb effects.

The proper order of importance for possible causes of death is: burns, mechanical injury, and gamma radiation. Early estimates by the Japanese are shown in D below:. The Manhattan Engineer District's best available figures are: TABLE A: Estimates of Casualties Hiroshima Nagasaki Pre-raid population , , Dead 66, 39, Injured 69, 25, Total Casualties , 64, The relation of total casualties to distance from X, the center of damage and point directly under the air-burst explosion of the bomb, is of great importance in evaluating the casualty-producing effect of the bombs.

This relationship for the total population of Nagasaki is shown in the table below, based on the first-obtained casualty figures of the District: TABLE B: Relation of Total Casualties to Distance from X Distance from X, feet Killed Injured Missing Total Casualties Killed per square mile 0 - 1, 7, 1, 9, 24, 1, - 3, 3, 1, 1, 6, 4, 3, - 4, 8, 17, 3, 29, 5, 4, - 6, 11, 28 12, 6, - 9, 9, 17 9, 20 No figure for total pre-raid population at these different distances were available.