7 days ago
Victims mourned 40 years after JAL plane crash
Victims of the 1985 crash of a Japan Airlines jumbo jet were remembered Tuesday on the mountainous accident site in Gunma Prefecture.
Bereaved family members and others went on a memorial hike to the Osutaka Ridge, the site of the crash in the village of Ueno, in the prefecture, which claimed 520 lives.
They prayed for the deceased in front of memorial markers scattered along the trail.
"It's been 40 years," Kimi Ozawa, 69, who lost her husband, Takayuki, then 29, said to the marker. She prayed with her 39-year-old son, Hideaki.
"(Osutaka) has now become a place where bereaved families gather to pray for safety," said Ozawa, who lives in Toyonaka in the prefecture of Osaka.
"Climbing the mountain again, I think 40 years have passed so quickly," said Toshitami Tsuji, 53, a business owner who lost his father, Masanori, then 39, in the accident.
He began climbing the mountain at the same age his father was at the time of the crash as it took years for him to accept his father's death. "I realized that my father would have had many things he wanted to do," he said, renewing his resolve to pass on the story to prevent the accident from being forgotten.
Junya Kobayashi, 35, from Tokyo's Shinagawa Ward, joined the memorial climb with his family to mourn his uncle, Hiroyuki Kato, then 21. "We were able to come here again this year," Kobayashi, who has been climbing the mountain since childhood, said. "I hope there will be no more transportation accidents."
At the ridge, the families gathered in front of the monument for the victims at the crash site and sounded the bell to wish for aviation safety.
At around 6:56 p.m. on Aug. 12, 1985, JAL Flight 123 — a Boeing 747 carrying many passengers visiting their hometowns during the Bon summer holiday season and bound for Osaka from Tokyo — crashed into the ridge, killing 520 of the 524 passengers and crew members aboard in the world's deadliest single aircraft accident.
