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Track Santa Claus using Google Earth
By siliconindia
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Monday, 28 December 2009, 19:33 IST |
7 Comments
Bangalore: Excited children awaiting the sound of sleigh bells can now track Santa's progress around the world thanks to a special website, developed by the North American Aerospace Defense Command (Norad). Norad has employed all its high tech equipment to follow Father Christmas as he and the reindeers travel the globe delivering presents, reports Wall Street Journal.
The Norad Santa Tracker tradition dates back to 1955 when a Colorado Springs store ran an advertisement encouraging local children to call a special telephone hot line. A printing error meant that the phone number for the Director of Operations at Continental Air Defense Command (CONAD) was published instead, leading to the centre being inundated by calls from excited youngsters.
The Head of the CONAD, which later became NORAD, instructed his staff to give the children updates on Santa's position and the tradition was born. It now offers the service to children around the world via a google earth map, providing the information in seven languages including English, Spanish and Chinese.
Norad claims that it employs radar and satellites to track the infrared signal given off by Rudolph's nose. On Windows, the plug-in works with Google Chrome, Internet Explorer 6 or higher, Firefox 2.0 or higher, and Flock. Mac users can use the plug-in with Safari and Firefox 3.0 or higher and some Chromium builds. Google Chrome for Mac does not currently support the Google Earth browser plug-in.
After installing the plug-in, one can go to noradsanta.org to track Santa's progress using Google Earth in Google Maps. One can follow Santa's trail of presents, called his 'Sparkles Trail,' to see where Saint Nick has been. Clicking on any of the present icons gives a user-generated image in a pop-up window courtesy of Google's Panoramio. From the window, one can look at more Panoramio images from that stop on Santa's tour, follow a link to learn more about that location on Wikipedia, or zoom in on Google Maps to take a closer look.