North American air defense troops ready for 70th year of Santa tracking

A newspaper misprint began a Christmas Eve tradition joining holiday cheer with military technology

Seventy years ago, a child phoned the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) looking for Santa Claus – and found him, or at least some kindly military personnel who were willing to play along by helping the youngster to track Santa's location as he zipped around the globe.

NORAD, then known as the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD), took calls from children near its Colorado Springs headquarters by mistake.

According to NORAD commander General Gregory Guillot, the 70-year-old tradition of NORAD tracking Santa Claus' journey around the world on Christmas Eve began in 1955 with a newspaper misprint.

As the story goes, a Sears Roebuck ad included a phone number for children to call, but that number was wrong. Instead of reaching the retailer’s Christmas line, it included the unlisted number for NORAD command.

When the first child called, Colonel Harry Shoup reportedly decided to roll with the unexpected Christmas Eve surprise and told staff to check NORAD radar systems for Santa's location. He offered the same response to other young callers throughout the night.

Now in its 70th year, NORAD has upheld the tradition yearly ever since, describing itself on its Santa Tracker website as "the only organization that has the technology, the qualifications, and the people to do it."

When NORAD isn't tracking Santa, it handles aerospace warning and control for defense of the US and Canada, including warnings about unknown objects – like flying sleighs – plus potentially threatening missiles and aircraft.

"NORAD has successfully tracked Santa since 1955 using three tools we use every day in defense of North America," an agency spokesperson told The Register. "A network of ground-based radars called the North Warning System, infrared sensors on satellites more than 22,000 miles above the Earth, and, of course, our NORAD fighter jets comprised of U.S. F-16s, F-15s, F-22s and F-35s, and Canadian CF-18s."

NORAD told us that it doesn't have any advance knowledge of Santa's planned route, as he doesn't share that information with the US government, but they do know that he tends to follow a typical Christmas Eve agenda.

"He typically takes off from the North Pole at around 4:00 AM Mountain Time (6:00 AM Eastern Time) and heads west across the international dateline," NORAD explained - Santa has to start where it's later on Christmas Eve, after all. "He then zig-zags north and south as he delivers presents around the world."

NORAD explains that Santa typically arrives at homes to drop off gifts between 9:00 PM and midnight, local time, which is why General Guillot recommends children be in bed by 8:00 PM on Christmas Eve to avoid Santa skipping their home and having to backtrack later on. He does do that, according to NORAD's tracking data.

Given Santa may have OPSEC reasons for not wanting to be tracked so thoroughly, we asked the experts at NORAD why he doesn't upgrade his sleigh to make it harder to detect, which they said they can't explain.

"Even with the highest security clearances of some personnel here at NORAD, we aren't privy to upgrades Santa may be making to his sleigh for his magical journey," a NORAD spokesperson told us - all they know is that they continue to be able to track him every year.

It takes a village to track a holiday icon

Santa moves fast, and while it may have been easy for NORAD staff to track him on their own and respond to calls from kids back when the tradition was new, the Santa tracking operation received over 380,000 calls last year. With Santa tracking now an international tradition, it's become a pretty big deal that needs more people than the US and Canadian militaries can drum up.

"More than 1,000 volunteers – military and civilian members of NORAD and U.S. Northern Command, plus family and local community members – begin answering phone calls from around the world at 4:00 AM, when Santa leaves the North Pole," NORAD told us.

For those interested in volunteering, sorry, but you need to be a Peterson Space Force Base local in order to participate: NORAD doesn't farm out the work to remote volunteers.

Those who want to reach out to NORAD to learn where Santa is can call the volunteers at +1-877-446-6723 from 4:00 AM Mountain Time until midnight on Christmas Eve, and can also call directly from the Santa Tracker website, which will also host a visual Santa tracker once he lifts off on Wednesday morning for NORAD's 70th year of tracking the progress of the jolly man in red as he hauls Christmas gifts around the world. ®