Flight Command News

News to Know

While the test flights of Santa’s sleigh continue over the Pacific this week designers in the Research and Development Department are contemplating new colors for Santa’s sleigh this year.

The test flights focus on the function of Santa’s sleigh. But the final look of the sleigh, including the colors of it, are a last detail that many do not think about.

The truth is that they try to make Santa’s sleigh look unique every year.

Santa, as you know, loves the color red and it is always used on the sleigh in some way. Some years it is the dominating color, while other years red is more of an accent or a highlight.

Shades of red are used as well.

Elf Gerald Knudsen is a sleigh designer who specializes in paints and colors that are used on Santa’s sleigh. He tells me that he has already spoken with Santa about the look for this year’s sleigh and he’s very excited because for the first time Santa has agreed to let him try using the color black on the sleigh.

Gerald says most of the time the colors focus on red, dark green and gold. Some years he has been able to use white a little bit and once he was able to use the color purple. But never the color black.

Black will not be the primary color of the sleigh, Gerald says. It will be an accent color. But he feels black will allow the other colors of the sleigh, specifically the red and the gold, to take on more importance.

Gerald tells me his favorite design so far utilizes a black underside with dark green trimmed in gold on the sides. Then he said he’ll put “Santa red” on the front and the back. He also said lights this year will be something many will find surprising about Santa’s sleigh.

I’m not sure what he meant by that but I can tell you Elf Gerald knows what he is doing. Everyone goes to him for paint jobs. I know it will look awesome.

We’ll keep you posted.

We are pleased to announce that Santa has ordered the expansion of the North Pole Navy. The follow ships have been deployed for service in the following locations:

SS Jingle Bell – Flagship serving in the Pacific
SS Snowball – Serving in the Arctic Ocean
SS Tannenbaum – Serving in the Indian Ocean
SS Donner – Serving in the North Atlantic
SS Eggnog – Serving in the South Atlantic
SS Mistletoe – Serving in the Coral Sea
SS Frosty – Serving in the Southern Ocean (Antarctica)

These seven vessels serve the Santa effort non-stop between now and when Santa returns on Christmas morning. They have been deployed to these fields of service with full crews and enough supplies to last for the duration of Operation Merry Christmas.

They serve many capacities. They are, in effect, floating tracking centers. They support sleigh flights all over the world. They carry critical supplies and have access to warehouses all over the world. They work to supply and re-supply sleighs in transit. They support elf travel and accommodations year round.

These ships are crucial part of Santa’s operation. They receive little notice and, because much of what they do is classified, we are unable to share much of the news of their action and accomplishments.

We will do the best we can to share what news of them we can as the season progresses.

Test flights of Santa’s sleigh have started as the 150 day milestone to Santa’s launch is observed.

12 sleighs have taken to the skies of South America, also known at North Pole Flight Command as Sector 4.

On the ground, the regional tracking center located in Milagro, Ecuador has been active and is now controlling those flights. It is very early in the process and engineers from there inform us that for the next several days the sleighs will be flying in “easy mode” – which translates to moderate speeds and altitude.

It is expected they will be in Sector 4 through at least the first part of next week.

North Pole Flight Command is hopeful that a flight schedule for the next month or so can be announced by the end of this week.

Tracking of the test flights of Santa’s sleigh can be done at SantaTrackers.net.

North Pole Flight Command announces a historic first for Sector 3, which covers the continents of Africa and Europe. This year’s regional headquarters will be located in Africa for the first time. Bethlehem, South Africa was chosen for it’s temperate climate, it’s central location within Sector 3, and for it’s available amenities useful in the support of Santa’s flight.

Elf Rolf and team are there rushing to get the facility open and ready to track test flights of Santa’s sleigh. It is winter there now and it is expected to see a lot of action early in the test flight process because of that.

Bethlehem is named after the other city of the same name, located in Palestine, which also hosts a regional tracking center, as announced last week by Flight Command. It is a historic first in many ways for Santa’s flight.

Bethlehem in South Africa, while not a remote location, is no large city, having just 25,000 estimated inhabitants. The name Bethlehem means “House of Bread”.

We will provide more details of this location once we receive a report from Elf Rolf.