How a wrong number led to NORAD tracking Santa
Each Dec. 24, Santa Claus makes a magical journey around the Earth, delivering presents to good boys and girls. Over 60 years ago, the U.S. Air Force started tracking Santa on his global mission.
But did you know that the origin of the NORAD Santa Tracker was based on a misprinted telephone number?
The first time the Air Force tracked Santa's flight was on Dec. 24, 1948. It reported an "unidentified sleigh and eight reindeer at 14,000 feet and flying due south from the North Pole."
This was the first time the U.S. armed forces had ever issued a report about St. Nick's Christmas Eve flight. Several news agencies passed the report on to their readers and radio listeners.
But this was a one-time report, with no other Santa updates issued for the next several years.
The wrong number that started it all
On Dec. 24, 1955, a child looking to speak with Santa Claus dialed a phone number for a Santa hotline. The number was misprinted in the newspaper — it wasn't for the Santa hotline but for the Continental Air Defense Command Operations Center in Colorado. Throughout Christmas Eve, calls came in from children asking about the location of Santa Claus.
Col. Harry Shoup, the commander on duty, answered the first call of the evening. He was surprised but quickly realized what was happening and assured the child that the Air Force would guarantee Santa a safe flight from the North Pole. As calls continued to come in, Shoup directed his operator to give the callers an update on Santa's location.
The media found out about the accidental tracking of Santa and reported it. Little did anyone know at the time, but this misprinted phone number was about to start a yearly tradition that continues to this day.
The tracking tradition begins
There were no plans for the Air Force to track Santa the following year. But after finding out that news agencies were now expecting the Air Force to track Santa, Shoup decided they would do it again on Christmas Eve 1956. With that, the tradition of the Santa Tracker was born.
In 1958, the North American Air Defense Command (NORAD) took over the task of tracking Santa and with that, NORAD Tracks Santa was born.
Eventually, the Air Force published a phone number for callers to get an update on Santa Claus.
NORAD Tracks Santa today
With the dawn of the internet, NORAD's Santa Tracker became even more popular. Not only could children call for Christmas-time updates but they could write emails and actually track Kris Kringle and his reindeer online with computers.
Hundreds of servicemen and servicewomen staff the phones every Christmas Eve. During an average year, the volunteers field around 100,000 phone calls and over 10,000 emails.
The NORAD Santa Tracker website sees roughly 9 million visitors each year.
You too can track Santa Claus and his reindeer on Christmas Eve. Just go to the NORAD Tracks Santa website, noradsanta.org.
