One morning in December 1955, at the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) office in Colorado Springs, Colo., one of the top secret phone line reserved for an emergency call to report any Russian attack, rang and was answered by U.S. Air Force Col. Harry Shoup.
Readying himself to hear a Russian attack report, he was surprised when a little voice asked, "Is this Santa?". It turned out that an ad in a newspaper urging kids to call Santa that Christmas had trouble in one of the digits in the published phone number and thus, directed call to the CONAD office.
It annoyed them at first but realized that it will be hard to pull out a country-wide ad and that it will disappoint kids expecting to talk to Santa. Col. Shoup's daughter suggested he just play it out and pretend to be Santa. He didn't follow that suggestion and instead, he just helped kids know where Santa is heading and where Santa's at that very moment. And so, the tradition of tracking Santa's whereabouts every year was born.
CONAD was then renamed North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), and is still doing the annual Santa tracking program. Every year, they cater to thousands of calls from different parts of the globe asking where Santa is. The tracking program starts on the 24th of December yearly.
More than a 1,200 volunteers came to the NORAD office in 2008 to answer ringing phones. More calls are expected this year and more volunteers will surely come to make Christmas a good one for the kids of the world.
Although the Santa being tracked in just a CGI, it will never replace the joy it will bring to kids who believes there is a Santa Claus flying over their house guided by his loyal reindeers.
Google as a matter of fact partnered with NORAD in the program in 2007 and until now is doing their part on the program by updating Santa's whereabouts on Google Maps and Google Earth, in 2D and 3D respectively. You can also visit Norad's http://noradsanta.org for more details.
Surely, no matter how bad the economy is or how far from the North Pole you live, it is Christmas and anyone, any child deserves to have a good one.
