Some Fukushima residents returning home after 3 years of forced evacuation

Three years after a devastating tsunami struck Japan and triggered a meltdown at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant, hundreds of residents from the Miyakoji district of Tamura city in Fukushima Prefecture were allowed to return home.

The district, home to 355 residents and 12 miles from the plant, was finally deemed habitable after years of containment work and setbacks. The evacuation order was lifted at midnight on Monday.

A spokesman for the nuclear plant's operator, Tokyo Electric Power Company, told CNN "We are doing as much as possible (to allow) the other residents can come home. We are strengthening support towards the residents (and) strengthening the decommissioning work."

In order for an area to be habitable, residents can be exposed to no more than 20 milliseverts of radiation per year.

One resident acknowledged to broadcaster NHK "Yes, I am a bit worried. But it's my land, my house, so I am feel safer and more at home here."

Eleven residential areas in Fukushima remain under evacuation.

[CNN]