A-Bombed Streetcar Tour Starts in Hiroshima

Hiroshima, Aug. 3 (Jiji Press)--A tour offering views of reconstruction in Hiroshima, a city in western Japan, following the U.S. atomic bombing 81 years ago aboard a streetcar that survived the blast started on Sunday.

The tour uses Hiroshima Electric Railway Co.'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.

Accompanied by a guide wearing a uniform cap modeled after those worn at the time of the bombing, passengers can use tablet devices to view images of the city before the war and in the immediate aftermath of the bombing.

[Copyright The Jiji Press, Ltd.]