17 Disturbing Photos With Horrifying Backstories
16. The Hiroshima Shadows
The atomic bombing of Hiroshima, Japan is one of history's most notorious incidents. The death toll was somewhere in the range of 90,000 166,000 people, with half of those deaths occurring in the first day. We're not going to get into the politics of the bombing, but instead were going to look at the horrific after-effects.
When the bomb named Little Boy was detonated, there was an intense bright blast that partially consisted of radiation. A person standing near the wall of a building could have obstructed the light just long enough that no radiation hit the wall behind them. When the unobstructed atomic flash hit the walls around where the person was standing, it charred the walls, but in the spot where a person had been standing, there was not the same level of discoloration.
What you were left with are permanent shadows, markers that serve as a constant memorial of the humans who once stood in those spots, instantly vaporized by the blast of an atomic bomb. It's a chilling reminder that war is hell.