History of the Santa Tracker

How a Typo began Christmas tracking at NORAD

Bill Petro
4 min readDec 22, 2022

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HISTORY OF THE NORAD SANTA TRACKER

How did a typo in my local newspaper erroneously connect to the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) Operations Center, since 1958 known as NORAD here in Colorado Springs, with requests for the flight location of Santa Claus on Christmas Eve in 1955 — and in years since?

And how can you check in on him this year?

NORAD Santa Tracker

Back in 1955, the Continental Air Defense Command home would eventually become NORAD in 1958. You’ve probably heard of NORAD in movies like Dr. Strangelove, Fail-Safe, WarGames, and ID-4. The North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is a joint U.S./Canadian military installation that sits 1,600 feet deep inside Cheyenne Mountain here in Colorado Springs.

When it was built in the late ’50s and early ’60s, it was intended to be able to handle a nuclear blast outside. Even in this day of MIRV nuclear missiles, NORAD maintains its reputation as a self-contained bunker and, for years, has been responsible for scanning the airspace above North America for missiles, aircraft, and near-space objects. I’ve visited the missile command center and seen the “big board” during operations, though the…

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Bill Petro

Writer, historian, technologist. Former Silicon Valley tech exec. Author of fascinating articles on history, tech, pop culture, & travel. https://billpetro.com