You're right, there wasn't any immediate danger of fission. It's just that now we know how deadly and powerful these things were, it seems almost endearing to see them being handled this way.
Are they? These aren't the multi-megaton nuclear behemoths that people associate with nukes post-cold war. Those bombs are three orders of magnitude more powerful than the one shown in the picture. This bomb is probably comparable to a warehouse full of conventional weapons, which the shirtless youngster was probably manhandling in his everyday work.
And unlike a conventional weapon, it's pretty hard for a nuke of this design to accidentally explode.
