Physics Of Santa Claus

As a result of an overwhelming lack of requests, and with research help from that renowned scientific journal SPY magazine (January, 1990), it's time for the annual scientific inquiry into the Physics of Santa Claus.

No known species of reindeer can fly. But there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not completely rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.

There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world. But since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to to 15% of the total -- 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau. At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each.

Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the Earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seemes logical). This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the Earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about 0.78 miles per household, a total trip of 75.5 million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc. This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man-made vehicle ever made on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a pokey 27.4 miles per second (a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour).

The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight. On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point #1) could pull ten times the normal anount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine. We need 214,200 reindeer. This increases the payload -- not even counting the weight of the sleigh -- to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison, this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth (the boat, not the monarch).

353,000+ tons travelling at 650 miles per second creates enourmous air resistance; this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecrafts re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 quintillion joules of energy. Per second. Each. In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second. Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.

In conclusion, if Santa ever did deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now.

It's all in the magic sleigh.

And Faith (that coming from a Faery )

Do not let this article fool you! Santa IS real.

Here are a few facts for you people: Santa stopped doing personal delivery service after the tragic and unfortunate death of Rudolph in a collision with a plane. He now sends his elves across the world to deliver the gifts. He's too fat anyway to get through the chimneys and he's tired of dieting.

There was nothing magic about the now deceased Rudolph the red nosed reindeer. He was a result of basic genetic manipulation.

Santa does not possess magical powers. He does however have access to very advanced technology that was handed to him by extra-terrestrials.

Incase anyone cares. Santa came from someone known as "st. Nicholas". He was a real person and he and was known for secretly giving gifts. It just grew from there.

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The flying, gift-giving Santa (if not real) seems to come from a mixing and matching of various myths and traditions. The modern North American Santa seems come from an early 1800's poem by Moore that we know as 'The Night before Christmas.' Moore's sleigh and reindeer didn't fly but the reindeer jumped up walls etc. Flying reindeer were more modern, as was Rudolph who first appeared in a Montgomery Ward catalogue.

The flying Santa may not be a matter of physics exactly. A Google search on Sámi and Christmas will likely find the Sámi, who are Lapland reindeer herders. The Sámi have a tradition of magic. Their shaman are said to shape shift and spirit travel to have knowledge of events in distant places. Flying sleighs are often depicted on their ceremonial drums.

Physics, however, can't be entirely denied. A spirit traveler does need a vehicle and fuel. The sleigh may be the vehicle, but the flying? Sámi shaman are said to feed fly agaric to their reindeer because reindeer are able to detoxify the mushrooms and render the 'er' fuel shaman needed for spirit travel. Apparently the reindeer jump around and act up after eating fly agaric. So, maybe the sleigh and Santa did fly--one way or another.

The tradition of gift-giving for Christmas seems to have come from many traditions. However, we moderns should keep in mind that in the Christmas tradition, gift giving is for wise men. Giving gifts doesn't make us wise, and it doesn't make the gift receivers princes(ses) of peace. Our PM recently stood in front of a 'patriotic christmas tree' and said 'christmas is all about giving' and then delivered a brief speech that defended his war policy.

Thank You Tom that was well researched