U.S. officials have revealed that more than 340 pounds of weapons-grade uranium was transported secretly over thousands of miles by truck, rail and ship on a monthlong trip from a research reactor in Budapest, Hungary, to a facility in Russia so it could be more closely protected against possible theft, the Associated Press reported.
The shipment included a three-week trip by cargo ship through the Mediterranean Sea, up the English Channel and the North Sea to Russia's Arctic seaport of Murmansk, the only port cleared by Russia for handling nuclear materiel.
Kenneth Baker official at the U.S. National Nuclear Security Administration, who oversaw the complex project, says the 13 radiation-proof casks, each weighing 17,000 pounds, arrived by rail at the secure nuclear material facility at Mayak in Siberia Wednesday.