Hasta La Gadget!

I hope for Santa Claus’s sake that the North Pole is sufficiently tech savvy, because the technology being used to track the overweight gift giver certainly is. NORAD–that’s the North American Aerospace Defense Command–has been tracking old Saint Nick every year since 1955, when a Sears store in Colorado accidentally printed Aerospace Defense Command’s phone number, causing local children to dial the NORAD predecessor, asking for Santa.

In recent years, the site has gone all Web 2.0, letting users follow Santa via Facebook, Twitter, and Picasa on December 24th. There’s also a countdown clock (currently at t-minus 22 days and change, for the record) on the official Santa Tracking page, which can also be installed as an iGoogle Gadget.

Perhaps coolest of all is the fact that the department also lets kids and other curious parties track Santa’s movements via Google Earth. Users with Google Maps on their mobile phones will also be able to track his movements by searching for “Santa” on Chrtismas Eve.

Check out some video from last year’s coverage, after the jump.