Santa Claus not daunted by arctic blast. U.S. military

Keith Coffman

DENVER (Reuters). – U.S. military officers have assured anxious children that this week’s arctic blast/snowstorm, which wreaked havoc with U.S. airlines, will not stop Santa Claus from flying his annual Christmas Eve flight.

“We deal with a Polar Vortex once in awhile, but Santa lives all year in one at North Pole, so that he’s used the weather,” said U.S. Air Force Master Sergeant Ben Wiseman. He is a spokesperson for the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), which tracks the yuletide flight.

NORAD is a joint U.S./Canadian military command that has been based at Peterson Air Force bases in Colorado Springs for over 67 years. The NORAD team provides images and updates of the legendary figure’s world journey, as well as its main tasks of monitoring air defenses, issuing maritime and aerospace warnings, and providing information.

Santa tracker was born from a misprint in a Colorado Springs newspaper that listed the telephone number for a department store where children could call Santa to talk with him. The number was later known as the Continental Air Defense Command.

A kind officer answered the children’s calls and confirmed that Santa Claus, also known by his nickname Father Christmas or Saint Nick was on schedule to deliver gifts to good boys and girls, as he flew aboard his reindeer-powered sleigh.

Santa does not submit a formal flight planning, so the military doesn’t know when or what route he will take.

Wiseman stated that military personnel can pinpoint Rudolph’s location by using infrared sensors once Rudolph, the lead reindeer of Rudolph, has switched on his bright red nose.

Santa stops to wave to Canadian and U.S. fighter jet pilots as they escort him over North America.

(Reporting by Keith Coffman, Denver; Editing and editing by Steve Gorman, Philippa Fletcher).