Northern Lights Forecast for Kiruna

Northern Lights in Kiruna

Kiruna is an iron-mining town of about 17,000 people at 67.85°N in Swedish Lapland. The mining company LKAB founded it in 1900 between two ore mountains, Kiirunavaara and Luossavaara. It is also a space town, home to the Swedish Institute of Space Physics and the Esrange rocket range, so the aurora over Kiruna is measured as well as watched.

Luossavaara, the hill above town

You can see the aurora without leaving Kiruna. Luossavaara, the 724 m hill on the north side of town, has a small ski slope and looks out over the town, the mine and the mountains. The tourist office’s advice is to walk a little way past the car park for the open view.

LKAB and the move east

In 2004 LKAB told the municipality that mining at deeper levels in Kiirunavaara would break up the ground under the town center, and Kiruna began rebuilding itself about 3 km to the east. Its relocated center was inaugurated in 2022. Kiruna Church, built in 1909 to 1912 to Gustaf Wickman’s design, was moved whole over two days in August 2025 along a 5 km route built for the purpose. It now stands between the cemetery and the town center, turned around to face the town. LKAB’s visitor center runs guided tours into the mine.

IRF’s all-sky camera and Esrange

The Swedish Institute of Space Physics (IRF) started in 1957 as the Kiruna Geophysical Observatory and has its head office just outside the center. All-sky cameras have photographed the Kiruna sky since then, and IRF posts the current camera’s picture of the whole sky online once a minute, so you can check from indoors whether the aurora is out.

Esrange Space Center, about 45 km from town by road through Jukkasjärvi, was built partly for rocket research in the auroral zone. Its visitor center outside the gate is open to anyone.

Nikkaluokta and the road toward Kebnekaise

The public road west from Kiruna ends after about 70 km at Nikkaluokta, a Sámi village on the boundary between the Laevas and Girjas reindeer-herding communities. From there it is 19 km on foot or skis to the STF mountain station below Kebnekaise, Sweden’s highest mountain. In the late-winter season, roughly the end of February to early May, snowmobiles run the transfer.

Polar night, the airport and the ore-yard station

The sun does not rise from about 11 December until early January, though around midday there are a couple of hours of blue twilight. The aurora season runs from September to March, with displays possible from late August and into April.

Kiruna Airport, a few kilometers from the town center, has flights from Stockholm. The railway station is out at LKAB’s ore yard on the E10, about 6 km from the center, on the line between Luleå and Narvik. Abisko is 93 km north-west on the same road and railway.