Kiirunavaara (

Northern Sami Northern may refer to the following: Geography * North, a point in direction * Northern Europe, the northern part or region of Europe * Northern Highland, a region of Wisconsin, United States * Northern Province, Sri Lanka * Northern Range, a ra ...

: ''Gironvárri'',

Meänkieli (literally 'our language') is a group of distinct Finnish language, Finnish dialects or a Finnic languages, Finnic language spoken in the northernmost part of Sweden along the valley of the Torne River. Its status as an independent language is d ...

: ''Kierunavaara'') is a mountain situated in Kiruna Municipality in

Norrbotten County Norrbotten County ( sv, Norrbottens län; se, Norrbottena leatna, fi, Norrbottenin lääni) is the northernmost county or '' län'' of Sweden. It is also the largest county by land area, almost a quarter of Sweden's total area. It shares border ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

. It contains one of the largest and richest bodies of

iron ore Iron ores are rocks and minerals from which metallic iron can be economically extracted. The ores are usually rich in iron oxides and vary in color from dark grey, bright yellow, or deep purple to rusty red. The iron is usually found in the fo ...

in the world.

History

The presence of iron in the area was known already in the mid-17th century, but at this early time communication lines to this northerly region were quite insufficient to permit any major exploitation. Only with the construction of the

Iron Ore Line The Iron Ore Line ( sv, Malmbanan) is a long railway line between Riksgränsen and Boden in Norrbotten County, Sweden, owned by Trafikverket (the Swedish Transport Administration). The line also contains two branches, from Kiruna to Svappavaara ...

railway at the end of the 19th century, which connected the ports of Narvik on the Norwegian Sea and

Luleå Luleå ( , , locally ; smj, Luleju; fi, Luulaja) is a city on the coast of northern Sweden, and the capital of Norrbotten County, the northernmost county in Sweden. Luleå has 48,728 inhabitants in its urban core (2018) and is the seat of Lu ...

on the Baltic Sea, did commercial mining become a realistic proposition. The Swedish mining company

LKAB Luossavaara-Kiirunavaara Aktiebolag (LKAB) is a government owned Swedish mining company. The company mines iron ore at Kiruna and at Malmberget in northern Sweden. The company was established in 1890, and has been 100% state-owned since the 1950s ...

(''Luossavaara-Kiirunavaara Aktiebolag'') has been mining the mountain since the beginning of the 20th century. The mining area around

Kiruna (; se, Giron ; fi, Kiiruna ) is the northernmost Stad (Sweden), city in Sweden, situated in the province of Lapland, Sweden, Lapland. It had 17,002 inhabitants in 2016 and is the seat of Kiruna Municipality (population: 23,167 in 2016) in Norr ...

and

Malmberget Malmberget ("The Ore Mountain", Finnish and Meänkieli: ''Malmivaara'') is a locality and mining town situated in Gällivare Municipality, Norrbotten County, Sweden. It had 5,590 inhabitants in 2010, reduced to 927 by December 2020. It is situated ...

, together with the iron port and steelworks at

, made

one of the first, and most prominent, regions of

heavy industry Heavy industry is an industry that involves one or more characteristics such as large and heavy products; large and heavy equipment and facilities (such as heavy equipment, large machine tools, huge buildings and large-scale infrastructure); o ...

in Sweden. The wider region has remained at the forefront of mining and steel smelting and alloying technology.

References

Kiruna Underground mines in Sweden Mountains of Norrbotten County {{Norrbotten-geo-stub

History

See also

References