The Hiroshima Peace Memorial Museum documenting the devastation caused by a U.S. atomic bomb in 1945 has welcomed 2 million visitors in the current fiscal year that started April, a record high since it was founded in 1955, the museum operator said Sunday.
The number of visitors reached 2,003,718 as of Saturday, reflecting an increase in overseas tourists due to the weak yen and growing public interest in the museum amid Russia’s war against Ukraine and the conflict in the Middle East, according to the Hiroshima Peace Culture Foundation, which released the preliminary data.
By around mid-March, the museum forecasts its total number of visitors to exceed 80 million since its opening, with the local government working to implement measures to combat overcrowding at the facilities.
The museum, located near ground zero of the atomic blast in downtown Hiroshima, displays artifacts from victims as well as other materials to convey the horror of nuclear weapons.
It opened 10 years after the United States dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in the final days of World War II in August 1945, killing an estimated 214,000 people by the end of the year and leaving numerous survivors grappling with long-term physical and mental health challenges.
The museum was designed by the late Japanese architect Kenzo Tange and was designated as an important cultural asset of Japan in 2006. During the Group of Seven summit that was held in Hiroshima in 2023, Joe Biden, then U.S. president, and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy were among the leaders who visited the museum.