Going home to Enewetak after H-test in the '40s

The people of the tiny Pacific atoll of Enewetak will have their homeland returned tomorrow (April 9), more than 30 years after it was surrendered to the United States for the first explosion of the hydrogen bomb. The US-administered trust territory of the Pacific government will bring in as many as 500 of the islanders who were moved from their homes to Ujeland, an atoll to the southwest, in 1947.

A $100 million program cleaned up the Enewetak, an atoll of 40 islands, and cleared away debris from 43 nuclear explosions. About 4,000 workers clad in protective clothing worked for three years to remove most of the radioactive soil and entomb it in a giant crater sealed with cement.