Getting ready for the most daunting logistics project this year – helping Santa deliver presents to millions of children, under the age of 14, within a time frame of 24 hours to every continent on the planet. Doable.
When we input Santa’s data and list of deliveries we discovered just over 526,085,400 children around the world that celebrate Christmas on December 25th. That translates to 22 million kids per hour, every hour, on the night before Christmas. Yes, that’s about 365,000 kids per minute; about 6,100 per second. Totally doable.
We needed to take into account the uneven distribution of kids in the world. If we started at the International Date Line and headed west, the first 4 time zones we passed barely contained a few million children waiting for presents, until he gets to Europe, where things break wide open.
We had a bit of a break with the people in the Netherlands and Belgium who celebrate Sinterklaas on December 5, which is the festival of Saint Nicholas. This is also the chosen day for those that celebrate Krampus, the evil goat-horned spirit that brings switches and bad dreams to the boys and girls of Austria, southern Germany, Switzerland, and far northern Italy. Krampus is more popular in the countryside of these areas and is basically Santa’s alter-ego. We could service these areas earlier in the month.
Back to the task at hand.
Time zone #1 – Most populous country: New Zealand
We cover it in 2 minutes, visiting 728,906 children
Time zone #2 – Most populous country: Solomon Islands
We cover it in 30 seconds, visiting 182,299 children
Time zone #3 – Most populous country: Australia
We cover it in 12 minutes, 30 seconds visiting 4,576,776 children
Time zone #4 – Most populous country: Indonesia
We cover it in 13 minutes, visiting 4,776,602 children
Time zone #5 – Most populous country: Philippines
We cover it in 1 hour, 56 minutes, visiting 42,379,542 children
Time zone #6 – Most populous country: Indonesia
We cover it in 13 minutes, visiting 4,482,995 children
Time zone #7 – Most populous country: India
We cover it in 23 minutes, visiting 8,404,995 children
Time zone #8 – Most populous country: Pakistan
We cover it in 8 minutes, visiting 3,097,648 children
Time zone #9 – Most populous country: Iran
We cover it in 2 minutes, visiting 525,909 children
Time zone #10 – Most populous country: Ethiopia
We cover it in 3 hours, 4 minutes, visiting 67,076,684 children
Time zone #11 – Most populous country: Democratic Republic of the Congo
We cover it in 47 minutes, visiting 61,154,001 children
This time zone is home to Turkey, the birthplace of Saint Nicholas of Myra.
Time zone #12 – Most populous country: Nigeria
We cover it in 4 hours, 29 minutes, visiting 98,240,977 children
This time zone accounts for nearly a fifth of the global total of children.
Time zone #13 – Most populous country: United Kingdom
We cover it in 1 hour, 8 minutes, visiting 24,988,831 children
Home to the British name for Santa, “Father Christmas.”
Time zone #14 – Most populous country: Cape Verde
We cover it in 27 seconds, visiting 166,619 children
Time zone #15 – Most populous country: Brazil
We cover it in 20 minutes, visiting 7,128,859 children
Rio de Janeiro marks the holiday with the lighting of a 280 foot tree.
Time zone #16 – Most populous country: Brazil
We cover it in 1 hour, 34 minutes, visiting 34,453,114 children
Time zone #17 – Most populous country: Brazil
We cover it in 1 hour, 48 minutes, visiting 39,377,883 children
Time zone #18 – Most populous country: United States
We cover it in 2 hours, 22 minutes, visiting 52,048,821 children
Time zone #19 – Most populous country: Mexico
We cover it in 1 hour, 47 seconds, visiting 39,164,884 children
Time zone #20 – Most populous country: United States
We cover it in 29 seconds, visiting 10,560,147 children
Time zone #21 – Most populous country: United States
We cover it in 1 hour, visiting 22,084,344 children
Time zone #22 – Most populous country: United States
We cover it in 1 minute, visiting 326,913 children
Time zone #23 – Most populous country: United States
We cover it in 1 minute, visiting 326,913 children
Time zone #24 – Most populous country: Samoa
We cover it in 12 seconds, visiting 714,652 children
Twenty-four hours later we managed over half a billion deliveries, all the while distracting the experts at NORAD with decoys. We deliver, with Santa.
Happy Holidays!
Article meant for entertainment purposes only. Data Source: Atlantic Magazine
