Iwao Kimura, 79 Asaminami Ward, Hiroshima

Father and younger sisters lost to the atomic bomb

Speaking in Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park, Iwao Kimura says, "I want to tell people about how the survivors rose again from the tragedy of the atomic bombing."

Left school to start working / Shares experience in his tax

Iwao Kimura, 79, who was exposed to the atomic bomb when he was 13, shares his experiences with customers while working as a taxi driver. "It was an enormous catastrophe that can't be imagined by looking at the city today," he said. "I want to convey that fact, even if only a little."

On the day of the bombing, he was in the Hiroshima Shipyard of Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (located in present-day Naka Ward), 4.3 kilometers from the hypocenter. Because of the shortage of workers for the war effort, students, including Mr. Kimura, had been mobilized to help. He was waiting for the signal to start working when the bomb flashed and the blast hit. He quickly covered his head. Leaving the building, he saw the mushroom cloud rising above the city. He was worried about his family so he tried to return home to the Hirosekita area, about 1 kilometer from the hypocenter, but he wasn窶冲 able to approach his house due to the heat from the fire that had erupted. He retreated back to the shipyard, where he spent a sleepless night in an air raid shelter.

Photograph of Mr. Kimura when he was about 18 years of age and working at a bakery in Osaka.

He was reunited with his parents at an evacuation site, Furuichi Elementary School in today's Asaminami Ward. His father suffered only light injuries, but his mother had fallen unconscious as a result of burns and broken bones. He had seven siblings, who met a range of fates. An older brother, 18, was off fighting the war, while two other siblings had been evacuated before the bombing when groups of students left the city. An older sister, 16, who he was still living with, went missing, while a 2-year-old sister died near his home. His 6-year-old brother was at Tenma Elementary School when the bomb exploded, and his 4-year-old sister was trapped under their fallen house. His father was frantic to rescue her, but when the fire drew near, his father's friend pulled him away. "I could feel my father's pain," Mr. Kimura said, explaining that when he learned about this incident after his father's death, he cried and cried.

Soon after the relief he felt at being reunited with his parents, his father developed spots on his body and his hair fell out. These were the effects of the radiation he was exposed to when he went searching through the city for family members. He passed away on September 5. On a bank of the river near his school, he said goodbye as his father was cremated. "How will I go on now?" he wondered. It took all his strength just to stand there. Even now, when he passes by that river bank, he thinks of his father and says a prayer to the Buddha.

After the war, Mr. Kimura went to live at a relative's house, along with his mother and remaining siblings. His mother had recovered from her injuries and was now working to provide for her children. Later, the family lived in a shack that they built in the Tenma area. The following spring, his younger brother Yuji, now 65, was born. But he was a tiny baby that could be held in two hands. It was eventually learned, with Yuji experiencing a delay in his development, that he had been exposed to the atomic bomb while in the womb and suffered A-bomb microcephaly.

Mr. Kimura stopped going to school in order to work and lessen the burden his mother was bearing. When he was 16 years old, he wanted to strike out on his own and so he left Hiroshima for Osaka. He worked in a bakery, baking cakes and pies.

At the age of 29, he returned to Hiroshima and started working as a taxi driver. But until he reached his late 30s, he was reluctant to talk about his experience of the bombing, for fear of being discriminated against. At the same time, he felt resentment toward his father for being unable to save his younger sister.

However, when he met a passenger who was eager to hear about his experience, he came to feel encouraged to speak out more. "It's because I became a taxi driver that I can talk about my experience of the atomic bombing," he said. 窶廝eing a taxi driver is my calling, and maybe it's my mission, too." As for his brother Yuji, he works for a dry cleaner. Because his mother, who took care of Yuji for many years, died in 1985, and his younger sister passed away in 2007, Mr. Kimura is now concerned about what the future holds for Yuji.

Mr. Kimura said he doesn't hold a grudge because of the bombing. He added, however, "If the atomic bomb was used to test its effects on human beings, that would be a terrible thing." And as a message for today's youth, he said, "I hope you will do all you can so a foolish war like that isn't fought again. Study hard and strengthen your thoughts for peace." (Sakiko Masuda, Staff Writer)