From Military.com:
“NORAD to Track Santa, Hoping
He's Not Hit by Telescope Launch on Christmas Eve”
(A photo shows the 2018 NORAD
Tracks Santa Operation Center on Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado, on Dec. 24.)
Santa may need to put his reindeer
on high alert this Christmas Eve to ensure he doesn't collide with another
high-flying object this year -- NASA's long-awaited James Webb Space Telescope.
At 7:20 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, just as Jolly St. Nick should be delivering
toys to children in the Eastern Pacific, the world's largest, most powerful
space telescope is scheduled to shoot into orbit around the sun aboard an
Arianespace Ariane 5 rocket launched from French Guiana. It may be the first
time Santa will need to keep his eyes on a rocket that can fly more than 10,000
miles a second that's carrying a payload weighing roughly 14,300 pounds. But officials at the North American Aerospace
Defense Command, which will begin tracking Santa across the globe beginning at
6 a.m. EST on Dec. 24, believe the old man will be ready. "Santa is an
excellent pilot, and he certainly can maneuver and dodge anything that flies
his way," NORAD spokeswoman Air Force Capt. Sable Brown told Military.com.
The launch of the telescope has been delayed several times since 2018, most
recently last week when it was shifted from Dec. 22 to Christmas Eve as the
result of a problem with a data cable. NASA officials said the team is not
taking any chances on getting the 30-year project into space.
Close Modal Dialog "We
are absolutely not taking any risks with Webb because this is already risky
enough. So we are making absolutely sure that everything works," said
Thomas Zurbuchen, NASA's associate administrator for science missions, in
announcing the delay. Santa, however, doesn't seem to scare NASA. "There's
so much riding on this," NASA administrator Bill Nelson told The
Associated Press, "opening up just all kinds of new understanding and
revelations about the universe." The launch adds a twist to NORAD's
66th year of tracking Santa -- an effort that began in 1955 when Air Force Col.
Harry Shoup answered the phone at the command's predecessor, the Continental
Air Defense Command Operations Center, and was asked if he was Santa. The
caller, a child, had seen a newspaper ad that accidentally had listed the
command's number as a point of contact for Santa, according to the Air Force.
Not wanting to be a Scrooge, Shoup answered that he was not, but his command
was keeping tabs on the red-suited, flying benefactor. Shoup then
directed others working that evening to say the command was tracking Santa, and
a tradition was born.
This year, nearly 600 volunteers
will make the NORADSanta.org website and app come alive, answering phone calls
made to 1-877-Hi-NORAD, or 1-877-446-6723, beginning at 6:00 a.m. Dec. 24.
As with last year, pandemic
protocols will be in place, with calls handled by volunteers all snug in their
Who Houses.
The website and app will show
Santa's location in real time as he crosses the globe and reaches the U.S.
"Twenty-four hours a day,
365 days a year, NORAD defends North America by tracking airplanes, missiles,
space launches and anything else that flies in or around the North American
continent," said Air Force Gen. Glen VanHerck, NORAD commander, in a press
release. "As we have since 1955, this December 24th we are once again
ready for our no-fail mission of tracking Santa, " VanHerck said. According
to NORAD, the command uses its North Warning System, with 47 installations
across Alaska and northern Canada, to pick up Santa as soon as he leaves the
North Pole. Officials then track him via satellites using infrared sensors,
which can detect the signal coming off Rudolph's nose. Visual confirmation is
achieved by pilots in Air Force F-15 Eagle, F-16 Fighting Falcon and F-22
Raptor fighter jets, as well as Canadian Air Force CF-18 Hornets. The pilots rendezvous
with Santa off the coast of Newfoundland to welcome him to North America and
"escort him safely through North American airspace until he returns to the
North Pole," according to NORAD. The effort has become exceedingly high
tech. In addition to the website, there's an available app, and the navigation
service OnStar, as well as Amazon Alexa, are programmed to help track Santa.
In 2020, 11 million visitors from
more than 200 countries and territories visited the NORAD Santa tracking
website and the call center received more than 20,000 calls, according to
NORAD, while Alexa answered 12.3 million queries to locate Santa and OnStar got
12,400 requests.
Santa tracking also is available
on Facebook @noradsanta, @NoradTracksSanta_Official on Instagram and
@noradsanta on Twitter.
In addition to tracking Santa on
Christmas Eve, NORAD definitely will be monitoring the space telescope launch,
as it does with every missile and rocket launch that occurs around the globe,
Brown said. "We will assure Santa's safety for every adult and child who
believes in him," Brown said.
^ NORAD Tracks Santa is a yearly
tradition that I still enjoy doing. ^
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