SPACE.com -- Cape Canaveral Readies for Santa Claus


	Cape Canaveral Readies for Santa Claus By Jonathan Lipman special to space.com posted: 06:09 pm ET 16 December 1999

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NASA officials confirmed Wednesday they will keep landing facilities at Cape Canaveral open on Christmas Eve in case Santa Claus is forced to make an emergency landing.

NASA traditionally offers its landing strip at Cape Canaveral to Claus in case of a mechanical failure or elf emergency, said spokesman Bruce Buckingham.

Trying to allay fears, NASA officials said even though Space Shuttle Discovery will be in orbit on Christmas Eve, the shuttle mission will not interfere with Claus's route.

"The landing area will still be open, both in the event of an emergency landing from Santa or an emergency landing of the shuttle," Buckingham said. "It's not a problem because they come in from different trajectories. Santa's coming in from a polar orbit and (Shuttle Discovery is) in an equatorial orbit."

Claus, who received interstate flight clearance from the Department of Transportation (DOT) Wednesday, will be flying a custom-built sleigh, powered by "eight tiny reindeer, with the possible addition of a ninth reindeer with a special air navigation warning light in its nose, in the event of heavy fog or snow," the DOT said in a press release.

Since Claus added Global Positioning System hardware to his sleigh in the late 1970s, Buckingham said NASA has been able to track Claus on his Christmas Eve mission "from the North Pole all the way down to wherever he chooses to touch down first."

"We're encouraging that he come first," Buckingham added. "I think he wants to start south and then work his way back north."

Unfortunately, despite unconfirmed reports that STS-103 Mission Commander Curtis Brown has indeed been a good boy this year, he and the six other astronauts will have to wait until Discovery lands, expected to be on Dec. 27, to receive their Christmas presents. There are no plans for a mid-orbit docking of Discovery and Claus' sleigh.

"We're going to keep the reindeers apart," Buckingham said.

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