A Russian Northern Fleet platoon, that was created to clean up Arctic islands, has collected over 50 metric tons of scrap metal and packed it into containers on Kotelny Island, RIA Novosti reported, citing Andrei Luzik, acting chief of the fleet's press service.

"According to estimates, Kotelny Island is littered with over 110,000 200-liter metal barrels that were used to deliver diesel fuel and lubricants to this Arctic island in Soviet times," Luzik said.

The eco-platoon was dispatched to the New Siberian Islands in late June with two hydraulic scrap metal baling press machines.

"The baling machines compress the thin-walled barrels by ten times and thick-walled barrels by three or four times. Each container can hold up to 800 compressed and baled barrels," Luzik said.

The eco-platoon has collected and baled over 5,000 barrels out of the 30,000 barrels that are expected to be collected this summer.