Kyoto Animation arson attack

On the morning of 18 July 2019, a man carrying about 40 litres of gasoline entered the Studio 1 building of Kyoto Animation in the Fushimi ward of Kyoto, Japan, doused the entrance and several employees with fuel, and set it alight. The fire killed 36 people, injured 34 others including the attacker, and destroyed most of the studio's materials and computers. It ranks among Japan's deadliest massacres since World War II and its deadliest building fire since 2001.

Kyoto Animation, known for titles including The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya, K-On!, Clannad, and Nichijou, operated Studio 1 as a production facility built in 2007. In the year before the attack, the company received more than 200 anonymous death threats. Its president said the threats' link to the attack was unknown, but police and lawyers had been informed. Japan's National Police Agency was told of the threats in October 2018, and officers temporarily patrolled the company's head office.

An explosion occurred around 10:31 a.m. after the attacker entered Studio 1 carrying the gasoline; investigators believed fuel vapor had mixed with the air inside the building and ignited. Witnesses said the attacker shouted “Die!” while dousing several employees with fuel before setting them, and himself, alight. Staff on the upper floors were trapped as smoke reportedly filled the second and third floors within 30 seconds of the blast; twenty bodies were later found on a stairwell between the third floor and the roof, indicating victims had been attempting to escape. Two Kyoto Animation employees chased the fleeing attacker, who collapsed on a nearby street and was apprehended by police about 100 metres from the building. The fire was brought under control that afternoon and extinguished the following morning.

Of the seventy people inside Studio 1, 36 died and 34 were injured. Because many victims had been burned beyond recognition, Kyoto police used DNA testing to confirm identities, a process that took about a week. Kyoto Animation asked media not to publish victims' names out of respect for their families, though some families confirmed losses independently, including those of color designer Naomi Ishida and director Yasuhiro Takemoto. Kyoto police released the names of ten victims, including animation directors Yoshiji Kigami and Futoshi Nishiya, on 2 August 2019, and the remaining names on 27 August. A further victim died of septic shock on 4 October 2019, bringing the final death toll to 36.

Police identified the suspect as Shinji Aoba, who did not work for the studio and was 41 at the time of the attack. After more than ten months of hospital treatment for severe burns, he was arrested on suspicion of murder and other offenses on 27 May 2020 and formally indicted on 16 December 2020. Aoba later told investigators he set the fire in revenge because he believed the studio had plagiarized a novel he had submitted to its writing contest; Kyoto Animation said the submission had not passed initial review and had no meaningful similarity to its published work. Aoba pleaded guilty on 5 September 2023 and was sentenced to death on 25 January 2024; the sentence was finalized in January 2025 after he withdrew his appeal.

The attack prompted donations exceeding ¥3.3 billion domestically and more than US$2.3 million internationally, and Japan's National Diet passed a measure making donations to the studio tax-exempt. Japanese authorities subsequently required gas stations to record buyers' identities for gasoline sold in portable containers, effective 1 February 2020. The damaged building was demolished by 28 April 2020, and a memorial, “Monument Connecting Will,” was unveiled in Uji City on 14 July 2024.