Dispatches From The North Pole: How Santa Gets Around

Editor’s Note: This is the third in a series of occasional dispatches from Dr. Larry Silverberg, a researcher at NC State who is leading a visiting scholars program at Santa’s Workshop-North Pole Labs (NPL). Dr. Silverberg is an expert in unified field theory and is accompanied by four other mechanical and aerospace engineers: Drs. Mohammad Zikry (novel materials), Greg Buckner (medical robotics), Fred DeJarnette (space travel), and Herb Eckerlin (energy conservation).

Well, now we’ve seen them. Flying reindeer are real. However, they’re not flying the way they used to. Several decades ago, propulsion researchers at NPL began to have questions about whether magic – which is the traditional source of reindeer flight power – is a renewable resource. Ultimately they opted to develop new propulsion resources, and they exceeded all expectations – on two fronts!

Santa’s well-known team of reindeer are now equipped with side-mounted jetpacks. Even more amazing, the jetpacks are powered by cold fusion and are arrayed in such a way as to create a stable reindeer-sleigh system. The sleigh’s reins are used to not only direct the heads of the reindeer, but to direct the orientation of the jetpacks for precision flight. Genius.

But even with an unlimited power source and phenomenal speed, population growth would make it impossible for Santa to visit all good girls and boys if it weren’t for another staggering breakthrough from NPL researchers: relativity clouds.

Based on his advanced knowledge of the theory of relativity, Santa recognized years ago that time can be stretched like a rubber band, space can be squeezed like an orange and light can be bent. By the early 1950s, he had found a way to take advantage of relativity clouds: controllable domains – rips in time – that allow him months to deliver presents while only a few minutes pass on Earth. He has only fine-tuned the process in recent decades. I’m definitely going to have to update my book  – Unified Field Theory for the Engineer and the Applied Scientist! The presents are really delivered in the wink of an eye.

Okay, that’s all for now. I’m joining some NPL colleagues (Drs. Eckerlin and Zikry) to go see the reindeer games. Should be a good time. I’ll write more soon!

Note: Previous posts from the series available here and here.