Atlanta first stopping point for Santa as NORAD receives record number of calls

Atlanta first stopping point for Santa as NORAD receives record number of calls
December 26, 2011
by Gene Rector
WRWR The Patriot

NORAD reported to media over the weekend that Santa's first stop in the United States on Christmas Eve was Atlanta.

The agency also reported a record number of participants in its annual "Tracks Santa" program.

The joint U.S. and Canadian command uses a network of radar stations to monitor the North American sky and seas on a continuing basis. But for the last 56 years, the North Amercan Aerospace Defense Command, headquartered at Peterson Air Force Base, Colo., has delighted children across the country and around the world with its unique holiday website and the tracking of the jolly old elf as he makes his rounds on Christmas Eve.

And 2011 was a banner year. Some 1,200 volunteers fielded about 102,000 calls, easily topping the previous record of 80,000.

The NORAD Facebook page registered 999,000 "likes" compared with 716,000 last year. Another 89,000 accessed Twitter compared to 53,000 in 2010.

NORAD's Santa tracking began by accident in 1955 when a Colorado Springs newspaper invited kids to call a Santa hotline. Unfortunately -- or fortunately -- the number mistakenly given was the operations center at Continental Aerospace Defense Command, NORAD's predecessor.

Despite the mistake, officers on duty accepted the calls, provided tracking information on Santa and a tradition was born.