I've just been watching a news item about this. They interviewed a NORAD employee who told us that the reason they can track Santa so well is because of the heat signature given off by Rudolph's nose. It was all very serious. I tried to log on to NORAD to see how long I have to continue to be nice in the hope of some gifts from Santa but alas the site was just log-jammed.
I've known about it for years, and one of our local stations always posts where he is during the 10pm newscast. I could care less for Christmas, but it's neat that they do that for the kids.
As an adult I find it funny that he "leaves the North Pole" right around the 5 or 6pm local newscast, rather than say the far more logical time of sometime late the night before when it's Christmas Eve, night on the otherside of the world. I mean, if he's just NOW getting started at 5pm CST he's got a LOT of time to makeup!
They're mistaken, he's not just leaving, he's been back to restock his sleigh with presents but whenever he does that he always forgets to reactivate his stealth shield.
Like death and taxes, there are two things you can count on for Christmas. NORAD Santa reports, and the annual 'How much would all the items in the Twelve Days of Christmas song cost.'