This adventure happened already mid November, but was kept secret until the transport safely arrived in Russian nuclear facility Mayak.
Ongoing project run by the US, Russia and IAEA, aims at sending all poorly stored radiactive material from former East European research reactors to a save place. This was the third that I have filmed, and for me the most exciting one.
On a sunny afternoon in Vinca, only a short drive from Belgrade, the biggest nuclear shipment in the history of the project was loaded onto 16 trucks, each weighing 25 tons (though the highly radioactive fuel inside had only about 13 kg). For security reasons, it had to wait till deep night to minimize possible risk of sabotage, theft, blockades. About 3000 security personnel of different brands were involved.
My colleague Greg, IAEA reporter, at one point complained that we and a BBC crew, which was in his custody, were not given any more access than all other TV guys that had populated the place during the evening got. Then the Serbians decided to give us more treatment than we probably wanted. We were given a police escort with a task to bring us to the destination ahead of the transport.
The convoy, about 1 km long, set off on a highway direction North. For some reason, we were not allowed to overtake it and could only use country roads. By then, we did not sleep for about 30 hours, which were filled by travel from Vienna and concentrated filming work. The police driver new the terrain and his car. We didn't. Trying to follow police blue light vanishing in the front, on bad roads, among other traffic, speeding up to 140 km/h, was one of the biggest driving challenges in my life. Knowing that any time I could loose control over the rented Chevy, with a father of two dozing next to me, made me really uncomfortable, though, the high alert kept me from falling asleep. One stop in-between, on a crossing which the convoy would pass, then full speed again. We arrived about 10 minutes ahead of the trucks.
The work went on straight away - the casks were reloaded on a train, which lasted till late morning.
Then only we had some sleep. For same reasons, the transport had to wait till after midnight. The train leaving has made an end of the adventure for me, but not for the others.
The transport went through Hungary to the Slovenian port Koper. There the casks were reloaded again, this time on a ship, which then started a 3 week journey to Murmansk. Another reloading, on a train, and a trip to final destination Mayak.
