Santa, this is North Pole Control Tower . . . you are cleared for takeoff . . . gingersnaps and cider await your return . . . Elf 73428 . . . over.
NORAD Tracks Santa Claus
When United States Air Force Colonel Harry Shoup answered an unexpected phone call on Christmas Eve years ago, he had no idea it would turn into an annual tradition cherished by millions of children worldwide.
It was 1955, at the height of the Cold War, and one night a call came when Colonel Shoup was director of operations in charge of the U.S. air defense network. He was keeping watch for Soviet missiles and bombers at the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Operations Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
When the operations hotline to the CONAD commander-in-chief suddenly rang, Colonel Shoup picked up the phone expecting the caller to be either the Pentagon or his own commander, General Earle Partridge.
It turned out to be a young child asking, “Are you really Santa Claus?”
It emerged later that a Sears Roebuck & Company advertisement in the Colorado Springs Gazette had misprinted the phone number for children to call Santa. The mistake put children in touch with Colonel Shoup instead.
But all was not lost. The colonel asked his staff to check their radar for signs of a sleigh flying south from the North Pole. Indeed, they found Santa and were able to tell the children his location.
As more children called, CONAD staff gave updates on Santa’s whereabouts.
CONAD continued the tradition of tracking Santa on Christmas Eve. So did its successor, the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD), the bi-national United States - Canadian military operation organized in 1958.
“It was quite exciting . . . I had no idea it would become such a big tradition. It just got bigger every year,” Colonel Shoup said in a recorded interview on the NTS Website.
‘When will Santa come to my house?’
The NTS Website is activated on 1 December every year. It features North Pole updates and new games and activities daily.
Since the website’s launch in 1998, the NTS program has grown tremendously. In 2007, the site received over 10.6 million visitors from 212 countries and territories, said NTS program manager Major Stacia Reddish in an interview from Denver.
In addition, more than one thousand ‘Santa Trackers’ volunteered on Christmas Eve at the NTS Operations Center at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs. Last year, they answered nearly 95,000 phone calls and received 140,000 email messages from children and families worldwide.
“Most of the children want to know where Santa is. The second most popular question is, ‘When will Santa come to my house?’” said Major Reddish.
“From all of our years of tracking Santa, we do know that he only comes to a home where the children are asleep. So of course the children need to get off the phone or computer for Santa to come to their house.
It’s a very exciting time. Santa moves very swiftly around the world on Christmas Eve. All the trackers are kept up to date on Santa’s location from our radars and satellites so that they can pass that information along to the children.”
From 4:00 a.m. Mountain Standard Time (MST) on 24 December until 3:00 a.m. on MST on Christmas Day, the website features up-to-the-minute reports on Santa’s journey around the world delivering presents.
In addition to radars and satellites, NORAD uses a worldwide network of high-tech cameras to take photos and videos of Santa. Google software will output live images from these ‘Santa Cams.’ The NTS Website lets visitors track Santa on a Google map as well as in Google Earth, which shows three-dimensional terrain and buildings.
The website has versions in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and Chinese. Most of the children who call speak English, but most of the volunteers are military personnel or family members who have background in other languages and are able to speak with children in different languages, said Major Reddish.
You can visit the official NORAD Santa Tracking Website at http://www.noradsanta.org/.
We are MFOL! . . . jingle bells, silver bells, making fun all the way . . . on the way to Christmas day . . . today and every day . . . Ho, ho, ho!
NORAD Tracks Santa Claus
When United States Air Force Colonel Harry Shoup answered an unexpected phone call on Christmas Eve years ago, he had no idea it would turn into an annual tradition cherished by millions of children worldwide.
It was 1955, at the height of the Cold War, and one night a call came when Colonel Shoup was director of operations in charge of the U.S. air defense network. He was keeping watch for Soviet missiles and bombers at the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Operations Center in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
When the operations hotline to the CONAD commander-in-chief suddenly rang, Colonel Shoup picked up the phone expecting the caller to be either the Pentagon or his own commander, General Earle Partridge.
It turned out to be a young child asking, “Are you really Santa Claus?”
It emerged later that a Sears Roebuck & Company advertisement in the Colorado Springs Gazette had misprinted the phone number for children to call Santa. The mistake put children in touch with Colonel Shoup instead.
But all was not lost. The colonel asked his staff to check their radar for signs of a sleigh flying south from the North Pole. Indeed, they found Santa and were able to tell the children his location.
As more children called, CONAD staff gave updates on Santa’s whereabouts.
CONAD continued the tradition of tracking Santa on Christmas Eve. So did its successor, the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD), the bi-national United States - Canadian military operation organized in 1958.
“It was quite exciting . . . I had no idea it would become such a big tradition. It just got bigger every year,” Colonel Shoup said in a recorded interview on the NTS Website.
‘When will Santa come to my house?’
The NTS Website is activated on 1 December every year. It features North Pole updates and new games and activities daily.
Since the website’s launch in 1998, the NTS program has grown tremendously. In 2007, the site received over 10.6 million visitors from 212 countries and territories, said NTS program manager Major Stacia Reddish in an interview from Denver.
In addition, more than one thousand ‘Santa Trackers’ volunteered on Christmas Eve at the NTS Operations Center at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs. Last year, they answered nearly 95,000 phone calls and received 140,000 email messages from children and families worldwide.
“Most of the children want to know where Santa is. The second most popular question is, ‘When will Santa come to my house?’” said Major Reddish.
“From all of our years of tracking Santa, we do know that he only comes to a home where the children are asleep. So of course the children need to get off the phone or computer for Santa to come to their house.
It’s a very exciting time. Santa moves very swiftly around the world on Christmas Eve. All the trackers are kept up to date on Santa’s location from our radars and satellites so that they can pass that information along to the children.”
From 4:00 a.m. Mountain Standard Time (MST) on 24 December until 3:00 a.m. on MST on Christmas Day, the website features up-to-the-minute reports on Santa’s journey around the world delivering presents.
In addition to radars and satellites, NORAD uses a worldwide network of high-tech cameras to take photos and videos of Santa. Google software will output live images from these ‘Santa Cams.’ The NTS Website lets visitors track Santa on a Google map as well as in Google Earth, which shows three-dimensional terrain and buildings.
The website has versions in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Spanish, and Chinese. Most of the children who call speak English, but most of the volunteers are military personnel or family members who have background in other languages and are able to speak with children in different languages, said Major Reddish.
You can visit the official NORAD Santa Tracking Website at http://www.noradsanta.org/.
We are MFOL! . . . jingle bells, silver bells, making fun all the way . . . on the way to Christmas day . . . today and every day . . . Ho, ho, ho!
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