“I was surprised to find out that the remnants of the transportation unit to which my uncle was assigned when the atomic bombing occurred still existed on such a scale,” said Masakatsu Takeyari, 76, as he overlooked the excavation site where it was discovered from behind a fence during a visit to Hiroshima's Central Park in late June.
The location marks the planned construction site for a new soccer stadium and is where barracks and other remnants of the Japanese Imperial Army's Chugoku District Transportation Soldier Recruitment unit (or Shichotai in Japanese) were discovered.
Shunji Okada, Takeyari’s uncle, was at the Shichotai facility when the atomic bomb was dropped and died as a result of the blast 76 years ago. Takeyari, a resident of Hiroshima's Minami Ward, was born in January 1945, and thus has no memory of his uncle. However, his relative has been on his mind since he was a child because his father, Shizuo, who died in 2001 at the age of 83, was close to his brother-in-law and often praised Okada as “a good man.”