Posted on 10/31/2019 1:11:56 PM PDT by BenLurkin
A fire at Okinawa's Shuri Castle, a UNESCO World Heritage site and a popular tourist attraction on the southern Japanese island, has destroyed a large portion of the historic compound.
Television video showed firefighters on Thursday trying to contain the blaze at the wooden castle. The compound's main, north and south buildings were destroyed in the fire.
"The cause of the fire has not been determined yet, but a security company alarm went off at around 2:30 in the morning," said Ryo Kochi, a spokesman with the Okinawa Prefectural Police. There were no reports of injuries, but about 30 residents living nearby had to be temporarily evacuated. Mikiko Shiroma, the mayor of Naha, the main city on Okinawa and the site of the castle, told reporters that she was "very shocked" by the fire, which she called "extremely regrettable," according to the Japan Times. "I feel as if we have lost our symbol," she said. "It is a World Heritage site that represents Okinawa. More than anything, I am very worried about the fact that many Naha citizens live in neighboring areas, and I have received reports that the fire might be threatening or affecting residents of the areas," the mayor added, according to the newspaper.
Reconstructed Shuri Castle, Okinawa, Japan. John S Lander/LightRocket via Getty Images The castle, which shows a blend of Japanese and Chinese styles, is a reconstruction of a 14th century structure. It later served as the capital of the Ryukyu Kingdom, which reigned in Okinawa from 1429 to 1879, when the island was annexed by Japan's Meiji government.
The original castle was destroyed near the end of World War II during the Battle of Okinawa after it was shelled by the battleship USS Mississippi. The reconstructed castle was finished in 1992, when it was declared a national park. The original castle's ruins were declared a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2000.
"Five hundred years of Ryukyuan history (12th-17th century) are represented by this group of sites and monuments," UNESCO says on its World Heritage website. "The ruins of the castles, on imposing elevated sites, are evidence for the social structure over much of that period, while the sacred sites provide mute testimony to the rare survival of an ancient form of religion into the modern age. The wide-ranging economic and cultural contacts of the Ryukyu Islands over that period gave rise to a unique culture."
World leaders dined in the castle during the July 2000 G-8 summit on Okinawa.
Japan's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters that the government would do its utmost to help restore the castle after Thursday's fire.
How unfortunate! My daughter and others from her unit visited this site soon after she arrived in Okinawa this summer.
The original Shuri Castle was destroyed by the US Army and Marine Corps of the Tenth Army and by the US Navy. What burned today is a reproduction, a Disneyland.
Even the three little piggies figured out to build a house out of brick....
Know someone who was just about to leave on a vacation trip to Okinawa. Main reason was he wanted to see the castle.
Right, they can just re-build it again.
Well the huge stone wall around it is still there.
One why would they need such a huge wall? Hmmm....
And there are a lot of older castle ruins on the island, also - fun to explore.
“This is the fifth time that Shuri Castle was destroyed following 1453, 1660, 1709 and 1945”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shurijo#2019_fire
I was in Munich once and walking around the main square with it's old medieval town hall with the fancy mechanical clock that everyone loves to stare up at. I came across a street vendor was selling postcards that had pictured of Munich after WW2. The main square was obliterated, there were just enough bits of building standing that you could tell it was the same place and it had been rebuilt in perfect replica. But it was in fact replica, the whole place. I brought that up to a German colleague and he said "After the war, every city of any size was destoryed. They all had to be rebuilt. Some cities, like Munich, decided to remake it exactly as it was. Others, like Frankfurt, decided to make a new shiny modern city."
So many of the places we tourists go to are not really what we think they are. But still, it's fun to be fooled and feel a connection, even a false one, to the past.
The good news is that they can still see it; the bad news is it’s not quite what they expected to see.
Those dates would seem to indicate better building techniques are needed.
Also is interesting to see the dates and wonder about the cycle of instability and fighting - assuming the previous losses weren’t just an accidental fire like the most recent one.
Half of population of Okinawa was killed. Okinawan boys as young as 14 were drafted by the Japanese to be on the front lines.
And still the Japanese refused to surrender.
Walking there gives you a good idea of why the Atomic bomb was necessary to end the war. The Japanese just were not going to give up for anything short of the threat of total annihilation.
And many of them not even for that.
Interesting how “natural causes” will probably be blamed just as Notre Dame.
Any moslems in that area?
“Listen, lad. I’ve built this kingdom up from nothing. When I started here, all there was was swamp. The king said I was daft to build a castle in a swamp, but I built it all the same, just to show ‘em. It sank into the swamp. So, I built a second one. That sank into the swamp. So I built a third one. That burned down, fell over, then sank into the swamp. But the fourth one stayed up. An’ that’s what your gonna get, lad — the strongest castle in these islands.”
arson
This topic was posted , thanks BenLurkin.
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