..........

I've been to both Hiroshima and Nagasaki. And felt totally ashamed standing amongst a sea of black and white clothed school children at both the memorial center and the Palace.

Many witnesses saw the package parachuting down above the Palace, which is pretty much central Hiroshima.

How could it still be standing if a truck was parked next to it? Surely the explosion would have just made a massive glass crater.

I agree that there were ground ops in place, as a good friend of mine who showed me around Hiroshima showed me where cameras were set up on each peak to film it. That story has passed through his family.

Too heavy to fly bombs?
General characteristics
Wingspan: 141 ft 3 in (43.06 m)
Height: 29 ft 7 in (8.5 m)
Wing area: 1,736 sq ft (161.3 m²)
Empty weight: 74,500 lb (33,800 kg)
Loaded weight: 120,000 lb (54,000 kg)
Max takeoff weight: 133,500 lb (60,560 kg) ; 135,000 lb plus combat load (144,000 lb on record[13])

Remember that the B-29 also carried the X-1 plane aloft, and many other X planes. I cant find a weight for the bombs, but I think they would weigh less than the difference between the stated unloaded weight and the maximum take off weight stated above.

Happy to be corrected.



The bombs reported to weigh 9,000-10,000 lbs, total weight not too much but with other issues about size and detonation. Supposedly, the "firing pin" or whatever, was not loaded until after the Enola Gay took off for Hiroshima. The Hiroshima bomb went off central to the courtyard of the Shimii Hospital.

I've never read that there was a crater, but fused glass and complete destruction at ground zero. The Enola Gay did drop something, and pictures were taken from the plane of the mushroom cloud after the explosion. For years people have questioned why there is no picture of bomb after it left the bomb bay of the Enola Gay.