

About 70 people were in the building when the fire started. Some 36 people are in hospital, some in a critical condition, reports say.

Rescue operations are still ongoing.įirefighters said they had found 33 bodies, two on the first floor, 11 on the second floor and 20 on the stairs from the third floor to the top floor, he said. The fire broke out at the three-storey building at about 10:30 local time (01:35 GMT) on Thursday. It is one of Japan's worst mass casualty incidents since World War Two. Japan's Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said the incident was "too appalling for words" and offered condolences. The suspect has been detained and was taken to hospital with injuries. Police said the 41-year-old suspect broke into the Kyoto Animation studio on Thursday morning and sprayed petrol before igniting it. The sense I get from other anime is that dango are a common snack among Japanese young people, so they would be attractive as a mascot character for children and teenagers, leading to the idea of the Dango Daikazoku.Kyoto Animation fire: Arson attack at Japan anime studio kills 33Īt least 33 people died and dozens were injured after a man set fire to an animation studio in the Japanese city of Kyoto, officials say. (The manga title uses different kanji to write "dango" that can also be read as "otokonoko" or "boy"). IIRC, Tomoya mentions early on that the dango daikazoku is old and unfashionable, but Nagisa herself is somewhat unfashionable, so it fits her.ĭango are somewhat commonly mentioned in anime and are even part of a saying, hana yori dango, which means "dango over flowers" (i.e., put food over aesthetic pleasures like flowers) and was punned on as the title of a shoujo manga. Nagisa has a dango daikazoku pillow, for instance. The Clannad anime is kind of unclear about where the song and characters come from, but within the world of Clannad, it seems to be some kind of mascot merchandising franchise similar to Hello Kitty. The Wikipedia page lists several varieties some of these are mentioned in the song, such as the "peaceful an dango" source. Mochiko is mochi flour, which is made from pounded rice. A dango is "a Japanese dumpling and sweet made from mochiko" according to Shawn Balestracci's Wikipedia link.
