Joy of Christmas

Children from around the world will again have help from the Canadian and U.S. military’s NORAD website to keep tabs on Santa’s location as Christmas approaches.

“Last year the website received over 940 million hits from 210 countries and territories,” Acting Sub-Lieut. David Lavallee said from Winnipeg today.

“I can remember myself sitting in front of the TV listening and watching and getting those updates. It’s different now, of course, with the website.”

The North American Aerospace Defense Command accidentally began its Santa-tracking program 52 years ago, when a boy from Colorado Springs, Colo., dialled a wrong number printed in a newspaper.

Instead of Santa, he got NORAD headquarters on the phone.

The commander in charge that night told him where Santa was, and the program began. At first, Santa’s whereabouts were reported through radio and TV stations, but about 10 years ago, the service moved to the Internet.

It now has more than 750 volunteers fielding calls from children. Last year, it handled 65,000 calls and 96,000 e-mails.

“Right now there’s a video that shows Santa flying around different locations in the world,” Lavallee said.

The website will also begin a countdown to Christmas, with interactive games, on Saturday.

“And starting at 2 a.m. on Christmas Eve there will be minute-by-minute updates,” he said. “There will also be Santa-cam images, video and still images of Santa around the globe.”

The website is available in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish.