At the Peace Museum, located in an elementary school in Hiroshima City near the epicenter of the explosion, it has been discovered that a chunk of glass that was on display as an atomic bomb artifact and appears to have melted due to the heat has disappeared.
The Hiroshima City Board of Education is consulting with the police on the possibility that someone took the items.
What was missing was a green glass block the size of a fist that had been on display at the Peace Museum at Honkawa Elementary School in Naka Ward, Hiroshima City.
At Honkawa Elementary School, more than 400 children and teachers were killed in the atomic bombing, and a portion of the school building that was exposed to the atomic bomb has been opened to the public as a peace museum, with approximately 30 atomic bomb artifacts on display.
According to the Hiroshima City Board of Education, in mid-November last year, museum staff noticed that a chunk of glass on display was missing.
The glass was found underground in the schoolyard by schoolchildren in 2004, and is thought to have melted in the heat after the atomic bomb was dropped.
It was displayed on the first basement floor, alongside two other lumps that children had also found underground, and was open for visitors to the museum to touch.
The remaining two materials have been moved to the first floor, where staff are always on hand, where they continue to be displayed.
The Board of Education has consulted the police regarding the possibility that someone may have taken the items away, and is considering installing security cameras at the facility in the future.
The Hiroshima City Board of Education said, ``It is unfortunate that the atomic bomb materials were lost, even though the effects of the coronavirus had subsided and the number of visitors was increasing.They are important artifacts that convey the horror of the atomic bomb, having been exposed to heat and blast waves, so we do not want to return them. "I want you to do that."