Construction The first aircraft to land in Sør-Varanger was part of a trial undertaken in 1922 by the
Royal Norwegian Navy Air Service to test the flight time from
Horten to Kirkenes. The mission was awarded to
Hjalmar Riiser-Larsen and
Finn Lützow-Holm, who chose to fly the 45-hour trip along the coast. The next landing was a military
Fokker which landed on the iced lake of Andrevann in 1934. Widerøe undertook several flights within the municipality in 1937, offering sightseeing and undertaking
aerial photography. The first scheduled service started to Kirkenes the following summer with postal flights to
Tromsø flown by Widerøe on behalf of
Norwegian Air Lines (DNL). The flight allowed post to be sent from Oslo to Kirkenes in one day and was continued the next season. There were public demands for passenger services be started. A limited service was kept in
Northern Norway during the resistance, but these were terminated after the German forces took control of the whole country. From 26 September 1940, three weekly services were operated from Trondheim to Tromsø, with two of these continuing to Kirkenes, using a 16-passenger
Junkers Ju 52. This was terminated on 20 March 1941, after most of the airline's pilots had fled to the United Kingdom to support the
Allied forces. Høybuktmoen was selected by the
Luftwaffe as one of three air stations in Northern Norway, along with
Bardufoss Airport and
Lakselv Airport, Banak. They built two runways, long, respectively. Høybuktmoen was primarily used for attacks against the
Arctic convoys. With the German withdrawal in
Operation Nordlicht in October 1944, the runways were blasted at several points. The damage proved easy to repair and by January 1945, both troops of Norwegian police officers from Sweden led by
Bernt Balchen and the
Soviet Air Forces could land at Høybuktmoen.
Reopening The first service after the war was started by DNL on 13 October 1945 and flew to Tromsø, with onwards connection to
Trondheim and
Oslo. The service only lasted until 1948, when it was replaced with a Ju 52 seaplane route with intermediate stops at Vadsø and Hammerfest to Tromsø. The route flew one direction each day, was only operated during the summer and was plagued with poor regularity. The original water aerodrome was located at Soldatbukta at Prestøya. Later it was moved to the quay on the north side of
Langfjorden, on the other side as Kirkenes. Passengers were therefore freighted across the fjord by boat to the aircraft. The
air traffic control moved from Høybuktmoen to Haganes in 1949, but returned in 1963. Varangfly later also bought an eight-seat aircraft which offered flights to Lakselv and Bardufoss, and to
Ivalo Airport in Finland, where it connected to
Finnair's service to
Helsinki. Planning for a new airport at Høybunktmoen was initiated by a committee established by the
Ministry of Transport and Communications in 1947, and resulted in the National Plan of 1952. Although Kirkenes was included in the plan
Alta Airport and Lakselv Airport, Banak opened the same year, and
Tromsø Airport followed suit the following year.
Operational history SAS introduced the 52-passenger
Convair Metropolitan on their domestic services, while Finnair served the airport with the 30-seat
Douglas DC-3 on their flights to Finland. In the first month the two airlines had 88 aircraft movements, while the
Royal Norwegian Air Force had 44 and Varangfly 60. Varangfly merged with two other airlines in 1970 to create the Kirkenes-based
Norving. The new airline bought an eight-passenger
Britten Norman Islander and started round trips between Kirkenes and the newly upgraded
Berlevåg Airport and
Mehamn Airport. This was later followed up with routes to
Hasvik Airport and
Kjøllefjord Airport, and in 1975 to
Båtsfjord Airport and
Vadsø Airport. To serve the regional services Widerøe originally operated twenty-passenger
de Havilland Canada aircraft. The new system was met with massive opposition in Kirkenes. Emergency meetings were being held between SAS Commuter and the ministry by June 1990 because of low regularity and many cancellations. Non-transfer flights from Kirkenes to Oslo were reintroduced on 1 April 1992, albeit with the services stopping at Tromsø. Service between Kirkenes and
Murmansk Airport were initiated by SAS Commuter in 1990, but the airline quickly terminated the service.
Aeroflot started two weekly services between Kirkenes and Murmansk and onwards to
Arkhangelsk Airport in June 1990. The service was summer-only until 1992, when they increased to an all-year service. Aeroflot terminated their service in 1998 The runway was extended eastwards by in the late 1990s. The first expansion took place in 1996 and the second in 2000. The airline changed its name back to Scandinavian Airlines in 2007. Norwegian Air Shuttle started flights from Kirkenes to Oslo in 2004, at first with four weekly services. The terminal building was almost unchanged since 1963, although it had seen some smaller upgrades. Avinor decided in 2004 that the terminal would be upgraded, consisting a new road to the airport, parking lot, tarmac and terminal. The investments cost NOK 180 million and opened on 4 May 2006. but low patronage caused the airline to terminate the route from December 2008. SAS reduced from two to one daily trip to Oslo in 2008. ==Facilities==