Origami cranes off to Japan

1000 origami cranes have been crafted by Dunedin residents at the Dunedin Public Art Gallery over the past three weeks for the annual "Cranes for Peace" remembrance in Hiroshima, Japan.

A holiday is held every year on O Bon Day in Japan to remember the victims of the Hiroshima atomic-bomb attack by the United States at 8.15am on August 6, 1945.

Countries around the world participate in the memorial day by making and sending paper cranes, which are placed on the statue of 12-year-old Japanese girl Sadako Sasaki, who died, on October 25, 1955, of leukaemia as a result of the bomb.

The cranes would be packaged and sent off today, gallery marketing manager Tim Pollock said.