Sweden moves entire 113-year-old church building on rolling platform

To protect the landmark 113-year-old church from ground subsidence, the Swedish government is moving the entire church in its far north.

The church is being transported 5 km away to the new city center in Sweden’s far north.

According to the BBC, the ancient red timber structure, built in Kiruna in 1912, is hoisted on rolling platforms and it is slowly moving towards its destination.

Kiruna Church is 35m (115ft) high, 40m wide and weighs 672 tonnes. It was once voted Sweden's most beautiful pre-1950 building.

The rolling platform has a top speed of 500m per hour with the entire church building on it and it is expected that the spectacular journey will be completed within the next two days.

The Kiruna region, 145 km north of the Arctic Circle, has long faced risks from a century of iron ore mining.

Talking about the relocation, the project manager Stefan Holmblad Johansson said, “We have done so much preparation. It’s a historic event, a very big and complex operation.”

He added that there is no margin of error, adding, “Everything is under control.”

This isn’t the first structure being moved away from Kiruna to safe areas as previously several structures, including the clock tower and so-called yellow row of three old wooden houses, were shifted to safer ground by the mid-2010s.

The entire journey can be seen on Swedish television, marking a rare moment when an ancient isn’t just surviving change but moving with it.