One of the moving trailers took a detour Sunday on its way to Nissan Stadium.

The 53-foot long hauler, the world's largest mobile refrigeration unit, inbound from just outside Toronto, took a tour of Broadway before coming to rest for the next two weeks just over the bridge.

But the trailer, which houses the machinery necessary to make and maintain the ice for the Nashville Predators' Stadium Series game against the Tampa Bay Lightning on Feb. 26 (TNT, 6:30 p.m.), was right back to work Monday.

That's when official, physical preparation began for transformation from football stadium to hockey stadium.

Crews will work round the clock in the coming weeks to turn the home of the Tennessee Titans into a the home of the Predators for a day.

Forklifts scurried to and fro on the field Monday afternoon, moving one by one each of the approximately 5,000 square pieces of material that will cover every blade of grass on the football field.

Men and women carefully secured each piece, a job that was expected to be completed Monday evening. After that another crew was scheduled to build the staging area where the ice will go.

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"Today is a big day for us, getting all of our equipment parked," said Derek King, the NHL's senior manager of facilities operations/hockey operations.

The rink build is expected to be completed by Friday, which will be followed by six or seven days for the ice build, all of which will be done after the sun goes down and before the sun comes up.

"There's no sense in trying to fight Mother Nature," King said.

Once the ice is ready, each team is scheduled to have a practice at Nissan a day or two before the game.

A team of around 250 people from the NHL work together on outdoor games. Many have arrived in Nashville, with many more to come in the coming days.

Steve Mayer, the NHL's senior EVP and chief content officer, who was instrumental in helping the league navigate through COVID the last few seasons, said this will be his 16th outdoor game since he began working for the league.

He landed in Nashville from New York on Monday afternoon, ready to help lead the team of workers into what equates to a speed round of Extreme Makeover.

"One of my mantras is we have to make the next one bigger and better than the last one," Mayer said. "That's our singular goal. So Nashville needs to be better than Air Force.

"We're constantly trying to test each other and try to make things unique and different."

Rest assured of one thing, rest will be anything but assured at Nissan Stadium in the coming weeks.

Reach Paul Skrbina at pskrbina@tennessean.com and follow him on Twitter @PaulSkrbina.

This article originally appeared on Nashville Tennessean: NHL begins work on Nissan Stadium for Nashville Predators Stadium Series game