The city of Nagasaki said Sunday it will change the venue for its ceremony to mark the 78th anniversary of the city's atomic bombing due to approaching Typhoon Khanun.
It will be the first time for the city to mark the occasion indoors since 1963. Nagasaki typically holds the anniversary ceremony to honor those who died in the U.S. bombing that devastated the city on Aug. 9, 1945, at the city's Peace Park. The Wednesday event will be observed at the Dejime Messe Nagasaki convention center instead, it said.
The city added the indoor event will be attended only by the organizers, with Prime Minister Fumio Kishida and foreign ambassadors in Japan not participating in the ceremony.
The slow-moving typhoon, which is the season's sixth, has already left dozens injured in Okinawa and brought prolonged disruption, including widespread power outages and flight cancellations, to the island prefecture.
Depending on the weather conditions, the event "may be cancelled," the city of Nagasaki said. If that is the case, the ceremony would be called off for the first time since the city began hosting the event in 1956.