Dozens of people from Okuma, a Japanese village near the crippled Fukushima nuclear plant, traveled deep into the radioactive restricted zone Sunday to hold a belated memorial for friends and family who died in the massive March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

Wearing protective suits and face masks, residents and media were brought in on government-chartered buses, allowed to stay less than an hour and then screened for contamination.

The families bowed their heads in silence as a Buddhist priest chanted sutras and burned incense for the dead.

Officials say the situation at the Fukushima plant is improving and has stabilized, but it remains unclear whether villages like Okuma will ever be habitable again.