On December 26, 2015, the reactor body was delivered to the construction site of the Belarusian nuclear power plant in Astravyets. The whole transportation took 72 days. The reactor body was placed at the storage site of the plant equipment yard.
The dimensions of the Belarusian nuclear power plant’s “heart” are impressive: its weight is 337 t, length — about 10 m, diameter — about 4.8 m. The reactor body has an extended service life time. It’s designed for 100 years of work with a service life of 50 years.
The valuable cargo has travelled a long way by water from the Tsimlyansk Reservoir in Volgodonsk, up the Volga-Don Canal, and along the river Volga,  passing by such cities as Saratov, Samara, Ulyanovsk, Kazan, Nizhny Novgorod, Yaroslavl, Cherepovets, through a Volga-Baltic canal, Lake Onega, the river Svir, Lake Ladoga, up the river Volkhov and to the Veliky Novgorod dock.
The most complicated stage of the transportation – unloading the reactor body from the barge to the autotruck and further transfer to a special railway transporter for oversized and overweight cargo – was completed in Veliky Novgorod from November 10 to December 14.
Railroad transportation took another 10 days.