COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo.—The North American Aerospace Defense Command expects the number of hits to its Santa Claus tracking Web site will top 1 billion this year.
Nearly 1,000 volunteers staffed the telephones Monday answering questions from the young and young at heart about Santa’s whereabouts.
Last year there were 435,000 phone calls.
“The two most popular questions are: ‘Where is Santa now?’ and ‘When will Santa get to where I am?’,” said Army Sgt. Gail Braymen, who was answering questions about NORAD’s program.
Visits to the Web site, available in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish, have grown steadily since its launch in 1997. It allows users to track a global map of Santa’s trek and three-dimensional aerial images of Santa and his sleigh using software provided by search-engine giant Google. Last year it had more than 900 million hits.
The effort is paid for through corporate sponsorships and the work is done by volunteers.
The tradition began in 1955 by accident when a “Santa hot line” listing in a newsppaer department store advertisement listed an incorrect phone number. Col. Harry W. Shoup, the commander at the time, said he didn’t have the heart to hang up on the young children who began calling the number.
He assigned an officer to take the calls and the tradition was born.
