0000, Tinian Time.: Colonel Paul Tibbets gives a final briefing at one end of the crew lounge. Seven B-29s are to take flight in the raid. The preferred targite is Hiroshima. Observation plane are the Great Artiste and Necessary Evil.
0015: Chaplain William Downey read a prayer that he composed specifically for this occasion.
Almighty Father, Who wilt hear the prayer of them that love thee, we pay thee to be with those who brave the heights of Thy heaven and who carry the battle to our enemies. Guard and protect them, we pray thee, as they fly their appointed rounds. May they, as well as we, know Thy strength and power, and armed with Thy might may they bring this war to a rapid end. We pray Thee that the end of the war may come soon, and that once more we may know peace on earth. May the men who fly this night be kept safe in Thy care, and may they be returned safely to us. We shall go forward trusting in Thee, knowing that we are in Thy care now and forever. In the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.
As readers here know, I feel that the dropping of the atomic bombs was an unjustifiable war crime. I guess it doesn't surprise me that a chaplain was called for a prayer, but it is sort of a startling thing to realize in a way.
0112-0115: Trucks pick up the crews to take them to their planes.
0137: Weather planes, Straight Flush, Jabit III, and Full House, take off, each one independently assigned to assess weather conditions over Hiroshima, Kokura, and Nagasaki.
0151: Big Stink takes off to assume its stand-by role as the strike spare plane at Iwo Jima. B-29s were notoriously prone to mechanical break down.
0220: The final Enola Gay crew photo is taken.
0227: Enola Gay’s engines are started.
0235: Enola Gay arrives at her takeoff position on the runway.
0245: Enola Gay begins takeoff roll. Colonel Paul Tibbets says to co-pilot Robert Lewis, “Let’s go.”
0247: The Great Artiste takes off.
0249: Necessary Evil takes off.
0300: Capt. William “Deak” Parsons taps Tibbets on the shoulder, indicating that they were going to start arming Little Boy.
0310: Parsons inserts the gunpowder and the detonator into Little Boy.
0320: Parsons and Jeppson complete inserting the charge into Little Boy, and climb out of the bomb bay.
0420: Van Kirk provides an estimated time of arrival over Iwo Jima of 5:52am.
0600: The B-29s rendezvous over Iwo Jima, climb to 9,300 feet, and set their course for Japan.
0715: Jeppson removes Little Boy’s safety devices and inserts the arming devices.
0730: Tibbets announces: “We are carrying the world’s first atomic bomb.” He pressurizes the Enola Gay and begins an ascent to 32,700 feet. The crew puts on their parachutes and flak suits.
0809: The weather planes fly over the possible target cities. In Hiroshima, an air raid alert is communicated.
0824: The pilot of the Straight Flush weather plane sends Tibbets a coded message that states: “Cloud cover less than 3/10ths at all altitudes. Advice: bomb primary.”
0831: The weather planes depart their locations. In Hiroshima, the all-clear is sounded.
0850: Flying at 31,000 ft, Enola Gay crosses Shikoku due east of Hiroshima.
0905: Van Kirk announces, “Ten minutes to the AP.” The Enola Gay is at an altitude of 31,060 feet with an air speed of 200 miles an hour when the City of Hiroshima first comes into view.
0912: Control of the Enola Gay is handed over to the bombardier, Thomas Ferebee, as the bomb run begins. A Radio Hiroshima operator reports that three planes have been spotted.
0914: Tibbets tells his crew, “On glasses.”
0914:17 (0814:17 Hiroshima time): Ferebee’s aiming point, the T-shaped Aioi Bridge, is in clear range. The 60-second sequence to automatic release of the bomb is engaged with the Norden bombsight. Luis Alvarez, one of the Manhattan Project’s senior scientists aboard The Great Artiste, releases two pressure gauges on parachutes in order to determine the bomb’s yield. People on the ground, looking at the single bomber six miles above, observe the small object as it floats down.
0915:15 (8:15:15 Hiroshima time): Little Boy drops clear of its restraining hook. Ferebee announces, “Bomb away.” The nose of the Enola Gay rises ten feet as the 9,700 pound Little Boy bomb is released at 31,060 feet. Tibbets immediately pulls the Enola Gay into a sharp 155 degree turn to the right. Ferebee watches the bomb wobble before it picks up speed and falls away.
A second air raid alert is called for in Hiroshima.
0916:02 (8:16:02 AM Hiroshima time): Little Boy explodes 1,968 feet above the Dr. Shima’s Clinic, 550 feet away from the aiming point of the Aioi Bridge.
90,000 to 100,000 people, most civilians going about their daily lives in a wartime distressed Japan, are killed.
Notably, priests in the Franciscan church founded by St. Maximilian Kolbe were unharmed.
0930 (0830 Hiroshima time): The Imperial Japanese Kure Navy Depot sends a message to Tokyo that a bomb has been dropped on Hiroshima.
1055 (0955 Hiroshima time): The US intercepts a message from the Japanese 12th Air Division reporting “a violent, large special-type bomb, giving the appearance of magnesium" has exploded.
1100 (1000 Hiroshima time): A message from Hiroshima to the Army Ministry references information about a new American bomb and reports that “this must be it", indicating that there was an appreciation that something new and awful was coming.
1458: Enola Gay lands in Tinian Island at the North Field.
1500 (1400 Tokyo time): The Domei News Agency telegram in Tokyo reports an attack on Hiroshima, but not the magnitude of the destruction.
President Truman released a statement:
Sixteen hours ago an American airplane dropped one bomb on Hiroshima, an important Japanese Army base. That bomb had more power than 20,000 tons of T.N.T. It had more than two thousand times the blast power of the British "Grand Slam" which is the largest bomb ever yet used in the history of warfare.
The Japanese began the war from the air at Pearl Harbor. They have been repaid many fold. And the end is not yet. With this bomb we have now added a new and revolutionary increase in destruction to supplement the growing power of our armed forces. In their present form these bombs are now in production and even more powerful forms are in development.
It is an atomic bomb. It is a harnessing of the basic power of the universe. The force from which the sun draws its power has been loosed against those who brought war to the Far East.
Before 1939, it was the accepted belief of scientists that it was theoretically possible to release atomic energy. But no one knew any practical method of doing it. By 1942, however, we knew that the Germans were working feverishly to find a way to add atomic energy to the other engines of war with which they hoped to enslave the world. But they failed. We may be grateful to Providence that the Germans got the V-1's and V-2's late and in limited quantities and even more grateful that they did not get the atomic bomb at all.
The battle of the laboratories held fateful risks for us as well as the battles of the air, land and sea, and we have now won the battle of the laboratories as we have won the other battles.
Beginning in 1940, before Pearl Harbor, scientific knowledge useful in war was pooled between the United States and Great Britain, and many priceless helps to our victories have come from that arrangement. Under that general policy the research on the atomic bomb was begun. With American and British scientists working together we entered the race of discovery against the Germans.
The United States had available the large number of scientists of distinction in the many needed areas of knowledge. It had the tremendous industrial and financial resources necessary for the project and they could be devoted to it without undue impairment of other vital war work. In the United States the laboratory work and the production plants, on which a substantial start had already been made, would be out of reach of enemy bombing, while at that time Britain was exposed to constant air attack and was still threatened with the possibility of invasion. For these reasons Prime Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt agreed that it was wise to carry on the project here. We now have two great plants and many lesser works devoted to the production of atomic power. Employment during peak construction numbered 125,000 and over 65,000 individuals are even now engaged in operating the plants. Many have worked there for two and a half years. Few know what they have been producing. They see great quantities of material going in and they see nothing coming out of these plants, for the physical size of the explosive charge is exceedingly small. We have spent two billion dollars on the greatest scientific gamble in history-and won.
But the greatest marvel is not the size of the enterprise, its secrecy, nor its cost, but the achievement of scientific brains in putting together infinitely complex pieces of knowledge held by many men in different fields of science into a workable plan. And hardly less marvelous has been the capacity of industry to design, and of labor to operate, the machines and methods to do things never done before so that the brain child of many minds came forth in physical shape and performed as it was supposed to do. Both science and industry worked under the direction of the United States Army, which achieved a unique success in managing so diverse a problem in the advancement of knowledge in an amazingly short time. It is doubtful if such another combination could be got together in the world. What has been done is the greatest achievement of organized science in history. It was done under high pressure and without failure.
We are now prepared to obliterate more rapidly and completely every productive enterprise the Japanese have above ground in any city. We shall destroy their docks, their factories, and their communications. Let there be no mistake; we shall completely destroy Japan's power to make war.
It was to spare the Japanese people from utter destruction that the ultimatum of July 26 was issued at Potsdam. Their leaders promptly rejected that ultimatum. If they do not now accept our terms they may expect a rain of ruin from the air, the like of which has never been seen on this earth. Behind this air attack will follow sea and land forces in such numbers and power as they have not yet seen and with the fighting skill of which they are already well aware.
The Secretary of War, who has kept in personal touch with all phases of the project, will immediately make public a statement giving further details.
His statement will give facts concerning the sites at Oak Ridge near Knoxville, Tennessee, and at Richland near Pasco, Washington, and an installation near Santa Fe, New Mexico. Although the workers at the sites have been making materials to be used in producing the greatest destructive force in history they have not themselves been in danger beyond that of many other occupations, for the utmost care has been taken of their safety.
The fact that we can release atomic energy ushers in a new era in man's understanding of nature's forces. Atomic energy may in the future supplement the power that now comes from coal, oil, and falling water, but at present it cannot be produced on a basis to compete with them commercially. Before that comes there must be a long period of intensive research.
It has never been the habit of the scientists of this country or the policy of this Government to withhold from the world scientific knowledge. Normally, therefore, everything about the work with atomic energy would be made public.
But under present circumstances it is not intended to divulge the technical processes of production or all the military applications, pending further examination of possible methods of protecting us and the rest of the world from the danger of sudden destruction.
I shall recommend that the Congress of the United States consider promptly the establishment of an appropriate commission to control the production and use of atomic power within the United States. I shall give further consideration and make further recommendations to the Congress as to how atomic power can become a powerful and forceful influence towards the maintenance of world peace.
Truman's comments about regulating nuclear power were spot on, but the association of nuclear power with the Atomic Bomb in the United States remains with us still, hindering our ability to develop nuclear energy, which we desperately need to do.
I'm linking this series of interesting podcasts in in spite of having a reason I normally wouldn't.
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