TASS, September 11. Most (23 of 41) abandoned Soviet-time facilities on the Kola Peninsula coast are cleaned, said press service of the Clean Arctic - Vostok-77 expedition that surveys that area.
Earlier, 41 abandoned facilities have been registered on the Kola Peninsula's coastline. The expedition's task is to collect most detailed information: what needs to be processed on the spot, and what needs to be transported to the mainland. The scientists say, of those 41 facilities 23 have been cleaned by the region, the Defense Ministry and the Clean Arctic project, the press service said.
"We have seen great conservation work or pulled down facilities in the Murmansk Region. We can see prompt and systematic work of the region, federation authorities, and the Clean Arctic volunteers. By the end of our expedition, we will map the facilities to clean as well as figures of the done job. I doubt any country may present such an applied work on a major cleanup of its coasts and islands. The Arctic is getting clean very quickly," the expedition's leader of cartographers Oxana Tolstykh said.
The expedition maps the USSR industrial heritage to be processes or conserved - to present it to the authorities responsible for the large-scale Arctic cleanup. "Most facilities to be processed are in the Kola Peninsula's northeastern part. Those are fueling and exploration facilities of the mid-20th century. The local sources say the facilities do not keep hazardous substances or big amounts of fuel," she added.
Clean Arctic - Vostok-77 is the biggest scientific expedition in terms of the number of participants in continental high-latitude scientific expeditions over the history of the North's studies. It will have 77 expedition teams. The route has been structured to meet the objectives, set by the Russian Academy of Sciences' research centers, and in accordance with due studies under university grants. Over a year-long term, 700 participants from more than 20 research centers and federal universities, as well as the Russian Geographical Society volunteers, will conduct 200 studies at routes that will be as long as 12,000 km. Such a large-scale expedition is organized for the first time in recent 40 years.