Streetcar A-Bomb Damaged Now Used For Tours In Hiroshima

Above, a Nagasaki streetcar in 2007. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

When I visited Hiroshima in 2004 with G-TOUR, we mainly confined our visit to the Atomic Bomb Museum and the Atomic Bomb Dome. 

At the time, I did not see any streetcars there. A few years later, I did see streetcars in Nakasaki when I visited it. They reminded me of old Los Angeles when streetcars were operating. They were removed in 1963 in favor of buses.

There is one streetcar in Hiroshima that did survive, although damaged, the atomic bomb. It is now being used for tours.

According to The Japan Times:

HIROSHIMA – A tour offering views of Hiroshima’s reconstruction following the U.S. atomic bombing 81 years ago aboard a streetcar that survived the blast started Sunday.

The tour uses Hiroshima Electric Railway’s streetcar No. 653, which was damaged in the blast on Aug. 6, 1945, in the closing days of World War II.

The streetcar resumed operations four months later after undergoing emergency repairs, and became a symbol of the city’s reconstruction. It is still operated for special events, with its livery restored to that at the time of the bombing.

The latest tour will run a total of 19 times on weekends and holidays through Oct. 31, on a loop line that opened in March.

To read more, go here. 

Definitely Not A Kiddie Show

The first (1951) season of the Adventures of Superman starring George Reeves was definitely not a "kiddie show".

Here is episode 5, "The Monkey Mystery", which had Cold War and anti-atomic bomb themes. Along with that, violence against Lois Lane (Phyllis Coates) and the daughter of an Eastern European scientist (with blood) on a train and the murder of an organ grinder are featured. 

Here's a clip from the episode (the conclusion):

Trump Invited To Commemoration of Atomic Bombings

Above, the Atomic Bomb Dome in Hiroshima. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

The mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan have invited President Donald Trump to their cities to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the atomic bombings that led to the end of World War II.

The Japan Times reported:

The mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have requested that U.S. President Donald Trump visit the atomic-bombed cities this year to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the attacks and the end of World War II.

“We hope that you will listen to the voices of civil society, visit the atomic-bombed cities, listen to the firsthand accounts of the hibakusha and fully grasp the inhumanity of nuclear weapons and accept the hibakusha’s earnest desire for peace,” Hiroshima Mayor Kazumi Matsui and Nagasaki Mayor Shiro Suzuki wrote in a letter sent Tuesday to the new U.S. president.

The mayors emphasized Washington’s key role in reining in the proliferation of nuclear weapons as “tensions continue to worsen” across the globe ahead of the anniversary of the attack on Hiroshima on Aug. 6, 1945, and on Nagasaki three days later.

The U.S. bombings of the two cities killed an estimated 214,000 people, leading to Japan's surrender and the end of World War II.

Above, the hypocenter monument in Nagasaki. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

To read more, go here. 

Breakdown of The History of UFO Crashes

Above, a crashed UFO diorama at the Roswell International UFO Museum. Photo by Armand Vaquer.

Since I have been holed up indoors due to rain and snow showers and not having posted anything pertaining to Unidentified Flying Objects in a while, here's a story that caught my attention.

If you thought Roswell, New Mexico was the first (in 1947) UFO crash, well, you're mistaken. The Trinity atomic bomb test in 1945 (two years before Roswell) caused UFO to crash. 

KLAS (out of Las Vegas) has an article with the breakdown of the history of alleged UFO crashes.

They begin it with:

LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Stories about crashed saucers and coverups have been around since the end of World War II. But now, these stories are being taken seriously in Washington.

When former intelligence officer David Grusch testified last July about nonhuman craft hidden away for decades inside special access programs, it caught some members of Congress and major media off guard.

However, the lore of crashed saucers and dead aliens is hardly new and the claims have leaked out many times in the past 76 years.

The grandfather of crashed saucer tales is Roswell. A story that didn’t emanate with UFO nuts, but came from the U.S. military.

To read more, go here.