NORAD reveals Santa's sleigh specs

WASHINGTON, Dec. 17 (UPI) -- NORAD's Santa-tracking program released information on St. Nick's sleigh indicating President Barack Obama was wrong about its specs.

Obama joked Monday at the Joint Base McGuire-Dix-Lakehurst in New Jersey that the C-130 military transport aircraft is "a little more efficient than Santa's sleigh," but the North American Aerospace Defense Command's Santa tracking program suggested the commander-in-chief underestimated the jolly old elf's preferred mode of transport.

"We really don't want to compare Santa's sleigh to a C-130, but what we can confirm is that Santa's sleigh is a versatile, all weather, multi-purpose, vertical short-take-off and landing vehicle," a NORAD representative told Business Insider. "It is capable of traveling vast distances without refueling and is deployed, as far as we know, only Dec. 24 (and sometimes briefly for a test flight about a month before Christmas)."

NORAD, which confirmed Friday it is ready to track Santa's Christmas Eve flight, released a fact sheet with "technical data" on the sleigh on the Santa-tracking program's official website.

Designer & Builder: K. Kringle & Elves, Inc.

Probable First Flight: Dec. 24, 343 A.D.

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Home Base: North Pole

Length: 75 cc (candy canes) / 150 lp (lollipops)

Width: 40 cc / 80 lp

Height: 55 cc / 110 lp

Note: Length, width and height are without reindeer

Weight at takeoff: 75,000 gd (gumdrops)

Passenger weight at takeoff: Santa Claus 260 pounds

Weight of gifts at takeoff: 60,000 tons

Weight at landing: 80,000 gd (ice & snow accumulation)

Passenger weight at landing: 1,260 pounds

Propulsion: Nine (9) rp (reindeer power)

Armament: Antlers (purely defensive)

Fuel: Hay, oats and carrots (for reindeer)

Emissions: Classified

Climbing speed: One "T" (Twinkle of an eye)

Max speed: Faster than starlight

NORAD has been tracking Santa yearly ever since 1955, when the phone number for its predecessor, the Continental Air Defense Command, was mistakenly printed in a Sears Roebuck & Co. advertisement and labeled as the telephone number for children to call Santa.