The us military command, tasked to defend the airspace of North America, was ready this Christmas weekend, tracking the movement of a man with a white beard in a red suit with a huge sack of gifts.
Until last night Santa Claus and his elves were busy at the North pole in preparation for almost the entire year to their transcontinental journey. While Santa on Christmas eve has flown around the world to deliver gifts to boys and girls who are well behaved, the North American aerospace defence command (NORAD) tracking his every move.
Marine Colonel Bob Brody of the 601-th aviation operations centre reported that the fighters were accompanied by the sleigh of Santa Claus and their employees «was watching them with satellites and the device to monitor the infrared radiation from Rudolph’s nose».
Now anyone can visit the official website of Santa tracker NORAD to view the route of the sled a favorite children’s character NORADSanta.org. Besides, on the website you can watch a workshop of Santa Claus, listen to Christmas carols and play themed games.
Program Santa Tracker started in 1955 because of an error advertising Sears Roebuck & Co, published in the Gazette of Colorado springs. The Sears is a phone number at which to contact Santa, wrote a hot line number command, continental air defense (CONAD — the predecessor of NORAD).
In the Christmas night air force Colonel Harry Shoup was on duty and answered the phone. Instead of tell the kids the truth, Show checked the radar and informed the impatient kids the whereabouts of Santa. This typo and the solution began Shupa, a 62-year tradition, which has gone beyond phone calls and went on the Internet.
Last year, NORAD Tracks Santa has received nearly 200 154 phone calls and 10.7 million unique visitors. Among users of social networks it has also become popular: 1.8 million followers on Facebook and 177 000 in Twitter.
Free phone number, NORAD Tracks Santa — 877-Hi NORAD or 877-446-6723.
