Dropped by an American B-29 plane, the notorious bomb instantly killed an estimated 80,000 people, while tens of thousands more later died of radiation poisoning.

Five square miles (13sq km) of Hiroshima were leveled by the disaster; only the Prefectural Industrial Promotion Hall is the sole-surviving piece of pre-World War II architecture near the bomb’s hypocenter. Preserved today in the same state as immediately after the blast, the landmark – better known as the A-bomb Dome – is inscribed by UNESCO as the Hiroshima Peace Memorial.

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