NORAD releases tech specs on Santa's sleigh
At the beginning of the month, NORAD rolled out its 2014 Santa Tracker, a fun tool kids can use to track Santa's progress as he makes his quick trek around the globe. While most kids likely aren't interested in any fanciful details about the more technical details of Santa's equipment, there's always that one kid who asks endless questions to which you have no answers. That changes this year, with NORAD releasing a technical specifications sheet detailing Santa's sleigh, including fuel consumption and max speed.
Recently, President Obama said the C-130 is a bit more efficient than Santa's magical sleigh, and so for an official answer on the matter, the folks at Business Insider reached out to NORAD, which responded with both a statement and list of technical specifications.
Said a NORAD spokesperson:
We really don't want to compare Santa's sleigh to a C-130, but what we can confirm is that Santa's sleigh is a versatile, all weather, multi-purpose, vertical short-take-off and landing vehicle. It is capable of traveling vast distances without refueling and is deployed, as far as we know, only on December 24th (and sometimes briefly for a test flight about a month before Christmas).
According to the saccharine sweet technical details, Santa's sleigh likely took its first flight on December 24, 343 CE after being designed by K. Kringle & Elves, Inc. It measures 75 cc (candy canes) / 150 lp (lollipops) in length, with a 40cc width and 55cc height. Takeoff weight is 75k gd (gumdrops), max climbing speed is "T" (twinkle of eye), and max speed is "Faster than Starlight". Fuel is hay, oats, and carrots, and the emissions are listed as "Classified".
SOURCE: Business Insider