Kamaishi Daikannon

The Kamaishi Daikannon is a 48.5-meter white reinforced-concrete Gyoran Kannon (fish-basket Kannon) statue that stands on a coastal promontory overlooking Kamaishi Bay and the Pacific Ocean. It was commissioned by Sekiou-ji Temple (石応寺) and completed on April 8, 1970.

The statue was built to memorialize the victims of the two Allied naval bombardments of Kamaishi — the first of which was the first Allied naval bombardment of a Japanese coastal town in World War II. On July 14, 1945, a US Navy task unit commanded by Rear Admiral John F. Shafroth Jr. (battleships USS South Dakota, Indiana, and Massachusetts; heavy cruisers Chicago and Quincy; and nine destroyers) shelled the Kamaishi Ironworks for two hours, firing over 2,300 shells by the US count (about 2,600 by the Japanese count). Japanese figures for civilians killed in the first bombardment range from 424 to 431, and about 1,460 houses burned. On August 9, 1945, a combined American-British-New Zealand force struck again, killing a further 270 to 283 civilians depending on the source. Totals vary accordingly: one tally gives 694 civilians and 30 Japanese military personnel, another 714 civilians, while Japan's Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, citing the city's war-damage record, gives more than 750 dead. The bombardments also struck a POW camp, killing 32 Allied prisoners.

The interior of the statue contains 13 floors with wooden figures of the Thirty-Three Kannon and the Seven Lucky Gods arranged along a spiral staircase. An observation deck on the 11th and 12th floors provides panoramic views from 120 meters above sea level. At the base of the statue stands a Buddhist reliquary (仏舎利塔) and Fudo Hall.