December 2025
This is not strictly Hemet history, but we thought it was fun.
Did you know that NORAD, the North American Aerospace Defense Command, tracks Santa on his journey around the world on Christmas Eve? It’s true! The countdown timer below tells you how long until NORAD starts tracking him this year and once the tracking starts, you can view Santa’s progress around the world. Maybe you’ll see Santa fly over Hemet!
The Santa Tracker
How NORAD Began Tracking Santa
In 1955, Sears, Roebuck and Co. in Colorado Springs, Colorado, released an ad in The Gazette newspaper, that encouraged children to call Santa Claus directly on his private telephone line to talk to him and gave a phone number.
A problem arose when the telephone number was misprinted one digit off and instead gave an unlisted number to the desk of Colonel Harry Shoup, commanding officer at the Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD). CONAD was the predecessor to the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD).
Shoup was irritated at first, thinking the little voice on the other end was a prankster. However, when the little voice began crying, he realized that he was talking to a young child. One call after another started coming in and Shoup ended up assigning airmen to take the calls, posing as Santa Claus.
The base had a large, glass board with a map of the United States and Canada that they used for tracking aircraft. On Christmas Eve, Shoup found that someone had drawn a sleigh with reindeer on the board, and he got an idea. He called a local radio station, identified himself as the commander at the Air Defense Command Center and announced that they were tracking Santa. Throughout the evening, radio stations called in for updates on Santa’s whereabouts. From that, a tradition was born.
The program has grown over the years, with NORAD later publishing a number to call for updates on Christmas Eve. In recent years, the annual operation had more than 1,000 volunteers taking tens of thousands of phone calls.
Today, the program may be best known for its website, showing a location for Santa, his sleigh, and reindeer moving around the globe. The Santa Tracker gets millions of visits a year, along with updates on social media and other platforms.
If you would rather talk to a live human instead of watching on the web, you can call
NORAD describes how they track Santa and protect North America:
It all starts with the NORAD radar system called the North Warning System. This powerful radar system has 49 installations strung across Canada’s North and Alaska. NORAD makes a point of checking the radar closely for indications of Santa Claus leaving the North Pole every holiday season. The moment our radar tells us that Santa has lifted off, we begin to use the same satellites that we use in providing air warning of possible missile launches aimed at North America.
These satellites are located in a geo-synchronous orbit (that’s a cool phrase meaning that the satellite is always fixed over the same spot on the Earth) at
22,300 miles above the Earth. The satellites have infrared sensors, meaning they can see heat. When a rocket or missile is launched, a tremendous amount of heat is produced—enough for the satellites to see them. Rudolph’s nose gives off an infrared signature similar to a missile launch. The satellites detect Rudolph’s bright red nose with no problem.The last system we use is the NORAD jet fighter. Canadian NORAD fighter pilots, flying the
CF-18, take off out of Newfoundland and welcome Santa to North America. Then at numerous locations in Canada otherCF-18 fighter pilots escort Santa. While in the United States, American NORAD fighter pilots in either theF-15s, F-16s, orF-22s get the thrill of flying with Santa and the famous reindeer—Dasher, Dancer, Prancer, Vixen, Comet, Cupid, Donner, Blitzen, and Rudolph. Even though Santa flies faster than any jet fighter (Santa actually slows down for us to escort him), all of these systems together provide NORAD with a very good continuous picture of his whereabouts.
NORAD is a joint organization of the United States and Canada, which defends the homeland through aerospace warning, aerospace control, and maritime warning for North America. Aerospace warning includes the monitoring of man-made objects in space, and the detection, validation, and warning of attack against North America whether by aircraft, missiles, or space vehicles, through mutual support arrangements with other commands. NORAD is headquartered at Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
Visit the Official NORAD Tracks Santa website.