Shadowing Practice: The Man Who Survived Both Atomic Bombs - Learn English Speaking with Video
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On the morning of August 6th, 1945, the US bomber Enola Gay flew towards Hiroshima, carrying a weapon unlike anything the world had ever seen.
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The weapon was an atomic bomb, and very few outside of America even knew that such a thing existed.
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In minutes, the entire city would become a graveyard.
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But down on the ground in Hiroshima, it was a clear summer morning, and the city was just starting its normal day.
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This morning was special though, for a man named Tsutomu Yamaguchi.
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Tsutomo was 29 years old and worked as an engineer at shipyards.
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Tsutomo was from Nagasaki, but he had been living in Hiroshima for the past three months, designing ships for the Japanese Navy.
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Today was the last day of his three-month-long project though, and he had a train ticket later that evening to Nagasaki.
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Tsutomo was excited that he was finally about to go home to see his wife and child, but instead, he was about to step into history's deadliest nightmare.
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As he was arriving at the shipyard that morning, he heard a plane buzzing overhead.
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This wasn't anything uncommon given Japan was in the midst of World War II, but this plane sounded different.
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He looked up at the plane and immediately knew it was a B-29 bomber.
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Japan didn't have any B-29 bombers of their own, so he knew this couldn't be a Japanese plane.
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As he's watching the plane go over him, he sees something drop out the back of it.
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Two parachutes then deploy from this object, slowing the fall.
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Tsutomo is watching this object in the distance fall, trying to figure out exactly what it is.
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The object then dips below the trees, and it stays silent for another moment.
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Then suddenly, a crazy bright flash fills the sky, and it blinds Tsutomo.
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In this split second, Tsutomo is completely disoriented, but he knows this extremely bright flash is an explosion from afar.
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He knows that the sound is coming next.
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He immediately dives to the ground for cover
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and he rolls over into a ditch Covering his face with his hands
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and plugging his ears just in time to hear a massive thunderous boom
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The force of this blast is so strong
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that even though he was ducking for cover in the ditch
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The energy of the explosion lifted him off the ground and spun him in the air like a tornado
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Tsutomo remembers flying through the air spinning and then BAM he slams to the ground and is out.
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Tsutomo was only about 3 kilometers or 2 miles from where the bomb detonated, and just about everyone else around him was dead.
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In this moment, when Tsutomo was out cold, he remembered thinking in his head that he was dead himself.
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He had memories and images of his wife and child pop up in his head, feeling like they were circling around him.
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But then all of a sudden, Tsutomo started regaining consciousness.
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He's able to open his eyes, but everything around him looks dark.
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His ears are also ringing, and he can't even hear himself think.
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There's objects flying all around in the sky, and massive fires are raging all around him.
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But in this moment of complete disbelief and shock, Tsutomo knew he needed to survive this to see his family again one day.
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Tsutomo knew that he needed to find shelter.
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Tsutomo then started rushing towards an army shooting range that was nearby.
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Tsutomo had been to this shooting range before and remembered that it had very large concrete walls.
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The range was built almost like a concrete bunker.
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When he got to the shooting range, there was a bunch of Koreans inside who were also caught on the blast.
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Their clothes had been ripped off their bodies and they were as red as shrimp from the burns of the blast.
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They were in the bunker screaming, help, help, in Korean.
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But Tsutomo was just as badly injured and there wasn't anything he could do to help.
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Shortly after, two students from the Hiroshima Technical High School came into the range.
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One of the students looked at Tsutomo's burns and couldn't believe how bad they were.
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This student reached into his bag and pulled out a special ointment that had seashells mixed in with it.
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The student then rubbed this on Tsutomo's burns that that covered his entire body.
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Tsutomo found a mirror inside this range and couldn't even recognize himself in it.
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Much of his skin was peeling off his body and he knew he was going to need serious medical help.
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Tsutomo then decided he needed a venture back outside to find assistance.
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He wanted to try and return to the shipyard to see if any of his co-workers and friends were still alive there.
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After leaving the shooting range, Tsutomo passed by the completely destroyed Korean barracks.
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Korea was under Japanese rule during World War II, so Japan forced many of these Korean men to fight alongside them.
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It's estimated that 70-80,000 people died instantly during the blast of Hiroshima, and 20-30,000 of these people were Koreans.
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Unfortunately, Tsutomu was in no condition to try and help the survivors, so he carried on with his journey back to the shipyard.
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Once he finally returned to the company's shipyard, the devastation was unimaginable.
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The whole area was littered with burned corpses.
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The company's dormitory, which is where Tsutomo had been living for the past three months, was also completely destroyed, so Tsutomo didn't have many options for where he could sleep.
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He didn't have much energy left, and decided to just fall asleep on the riverbank amidst the burning city.
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The next morning, Tsutomo woke up and finally had some good news.
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He overheard from a few other survivors that there was an evacuation train leaving for Nagasaki later that morning.
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Somehow the rail track was just far enough away from the blast
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that it was still functional and was going to help people escape to Nagasaki.
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Tsutomo couldn't believe the news, but he wanted to make one final stop before returning to Nagasaki.
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He had to go to his parents' home in Okamachi, which was just outside of Hiroshima.
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Tsutomo had no way of knowing whether or not his parents were still alive, but he had to make the trip just in case they were.
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Tsutomo then traveled through the fiery and obliterated city and walked all the way to Okamachi.
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Another air raid siren started going off just as Tsutomo got to his parents' home.
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Nobody was home inside it seemed, but Tsutomo went in and sat down in front of the family's altar.
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He sat there and finally had a moment to decompress
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and wait out whatever attack may be coming given the alert from the air raid sirens.
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Eventually, the warning was lifted without any attack, and he heard his parents coming back to the home.
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On the way in, Tsutomo heard his mother and father talking.
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The mother said that, we'll have to go to Hiroshima and collect his remains.
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Then the father said, even if we go, we won't be able to recognize his body.
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We don't know where he died, and we won't be able to tell one body from another.
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It was at that very moment that the father
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and mother walked in to see Tsutomo sitting in front of the family's altar.
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At first, the parents were wondering who had broken into their home as Tsutomo wasn't even recognizable from his burns.
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Then Tsutomo spoke and his parents realized it was their son.
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Tsutomo couldn't stay here for long though as he had to
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make his way across town to catch the train heading for Nagasaki.
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Tsutomo wasn't gonna lose his chance to see his wife and kids again.
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In order to get to the train station, he had to pass over several bridges.
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As he would travel over these bridges, below Tsutomo saw what he described as a river of corpses.
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It was unlike anything you could ever imagine, and Tsutomo ended up writing a poem about this devastating experience titled,
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And the River Flowed as a Raft of Corpses.
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Finally, Tsutomo made it to the train station and boarded the overnight journey to Nagasaki.
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The next day, now on August 8th, 1945, Tsutomo's train made it back to Nagasaki.
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He immediately went straight to the Mitsubishi Hospital next to the Nagasaki station for medical treatment.
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Tsutomo later described the doctors as heroes and did everything they could to treat his wounds.
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Tsutomo ended up leaving the hospital looking like the Michelin Man, where his entire body was covered with bandages aside from his eyes, nose, and mouth.
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was finally able to make his way back home to see his wife and kids.
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His wife and kid, like his parents, didn't even recognize Tsutomo at first, especially because of the bandages that covered his entire body.
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They were completely shocked to see him alive, however.
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The next morning, on August 9th, 1945, now three days after Hiroshima was hit,
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Tsutomo started making his way to the Mitsubishi office in Nagasaki for work.
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Tsutomo is still severely injured and mentally traumatized.
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This may sound insane that he was going to work just three days after an atomic bomb's explosion,
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but generally in Japan, people tend to treat their jobs with an exceptionally high level of seriousness, loyalty, and responsibility, much more so than in other countries.
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Not to mention, Mitsubishi was building military equipment for Japan during the war, so Tsutomu likely felt an obligation to help his country.
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Once he got to his office, like back at home, nobody recognized Tsutomo at first.
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It was only when they heard his voice was when they said, Oh Yamaguchi, you made it back to Hiroshima alive?
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Tsutomo was causing quite a stir around the office and everybody gathered around.
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They kept saying, He's back!
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Yamaguchi is back!
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Then Tsutomo's manager pulled him aside to figure out exactly what happened.
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There was a lot of confusion in Japan in the early hours and even days after Hiroshima was attacked.
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It sounded at first like just another city had been bombed by the United States.
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Tsutomo told his manager, though, that Hiroshima had been hit with just one bomb and the entire city was destroyed because of it.
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Everyone, including his manager, was refusing to believe this could be the case.
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They said things like, there is no way one bomb could destroy an entire city like Hiroshima.
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They also kept joking with Tsutomou by saying things like, you're an engineer, you must know that one bomb can't destroy an entire city as large as Hiroshima.
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Sutomo's manager was going on by saying, it must be the hit you took to your head.
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That must have done something to you.
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Others were even saying, I think this guy has lost his mind.
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I thought he was an engineer.
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As everyone was railing on Sutomo, not believing his story, right then, another flash came, similar to the one Sutomo had just lived through.
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This flash blinded him for a second, and then the energy of the explosion ripped off most of Sutomo's bandages.
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He's been through this before though and knows exactly what's coming this time.
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Tsutomu immediately dives under his desk without saying a word, and then moments later a massive boom thunders through the office.
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All the windows chatter and debris and glass fly everywhere.
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A second atomic bomb had just been dropped, this time on Nagasaki.
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This time though, he's not quite as injured as he was in Hiroshima.
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Tsutomu was at a similar distance away from ground zero of the blast, just about 3 kilometers but there was a small hill separating his office from ground zero,
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adding just enough protection to survive.
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Tsutomo rushed out of the office bow and ran back home to see if his wife and child were still alive.
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As he's running, he's making his way through thick clouds of ash and there's fires popping up all around him.
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He finally arrives back at his home, but is devastated to see that the whole thing had been reduced to just a pile of rubble.
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Tsutomo can't believe it and has no clue if his wife and kids were inside at the time of the blast.
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Tsutomo's wife had actually been outside of the house helping dig bomb shelters.
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She was inside one of these shelters working on digging more soil when the atomic bomb dropped on Nagasaki.
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Thankfully Tsutomo's wife was still alive and she was rushing back to the house.
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As for Tsutomo's son, he was outside with another girl from the neighborhood playing in the yard.
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As the explosion happened, a roof tile came flying and hit his son in the head.
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This is when the son said ouch for the first time.
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Miraculously though, the son and the schoolgirl survived only with minor injuries.
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Tsutomou had now just become a survivor of the only two atomic bombs ever dropped on civilians and somehow his wife, child, and even parents were all still alive.
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Tsu-Tomo ended up living an incredibly long life, living to 93 years old, until he finally passed away in 2010 due to cancer.
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But this story isn't the only time in history where fate seemed to defy all odds.
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In another disaster, decades later, just four people would survive one of the darkest attacks in modern history.
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The four people who survived above where the plane hit on 9-11 in the South Tower.
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You can find that video right here.
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What You'll Learn
This video is a goldmine for building real-world speaking skills. You’ll practice narrating past events with vivid details—perfect for sharing stories or describing experiences. You’ll also learn to convey urgency and emotion through tone, like when Tsutomu races to find shelter. Plus, it’s great for understanding context clues in fast-paced speech, since the story unfolds with quick, impactful moments.
Listen For These Sounds
Native speakers often link words, and this clip is full of examples. Listen for "in the air" becoming "in th’air" and "looked up at" turning into "looked up at" (with a soft "t" sound). You’ll also hear reductions like "he’s" for "he is" and "didn’t" for "did not." Notice how "buzzing overhead" flows smoothly—no pauses between words. These small sounds are key to sounding natural, and practicing them with a shadowing site can help you master connected speech fast.
Say It Like a Native
To mirror the speaker’s rhythm, focus on stress and pauses. Words like "massive," "thunderous," and "disbelief" get extra emphasis to create drama. Pause slightly before big moments, like "Then suddenly, a crazy bright flash..." to build tension. Try shadowing—repeating the lines right after the speaker—to copy their pace. This technique, called shadowspeak, trains your mouth to move like a native. For pronunciation practice, focus on the long "i" in "dive" and the short "a" in "blast." With videos like this, you’re not just learning English—you’re learning to speak it with confidence.
Whether you’re using a shadowing site or just repeating lines, this story makes English speaking practice engaging. It’s more than words—it’s about connecting with a powerful narrative while sharpening your skills. So hit play, listen closely, and start speaking like a pro!
Grammar in this video
The structures the speaker uses most, with the exact words from the video:
| Structure | In the video |
|---|---|
| Passive voice be + past participle — the focus is on what happens, not who does it | was built · were also caught · had been ripped |
| Relative clauses who / which + clause — extra information about a person or thing | dormitory, which is · Okamachi, which was · people who survived |
What is the Shadowing Technique?
Shadowing is a science-backed language learning technique originally developed for professional interpreter training and popularized by polyglot Dr. Alexander Arguelles. The method is simple but powerful: you listen to native English audio and immediately repeat it out loud — like a shadow following the speaker with just a 1–2 second delay. Unlike passive listening or grammar drills, shadowing forces your brain and mouth muscles to simultaneously process and reproduce real speech patterns. Research shows it significantly improves pronunciation accuracy, intonation, rhythm, connected speech, listening comprehension, and speaking fluency — making it one of the most effective methods for IELTS Speaking preparation and real-world English communication.