Unwrapping the Science of Santa’s Journey
It’s a question that has puzzled kids and grown-ups for centuries: How does Santa Claus get all those gifts to millions of homes worldwide in just one night?
In St. Louis, four-year-old Kaelyn this week suggested Santa “wraps presents ahead of time,” which certainly must help.
Standing near her at a recent performance of The Nutcracker, six-year-old Liam proposed a high-tech solution. “He has a gadget on his sleigh that makes it go turbo. He can go down the chimney in one second!” he said.
Over in Hillsdale, N.J., however, five-year-old Amelia offered a simpler solution: “Maybe he has a secret shortcut.”
Each of these kids may be onto something, according to Santa expert Larry Silverberg, a noted U.S. engineer and self-described “rocket scientist.”
“It’s tough to explain, but in his ‘theory of relativity,’ Albert Einstein discovered that space and time are bendable,” Silverberg said. While the theory is almost a century old, modern society has yet to harness relativity.
Santa did so long ago, however, and uses it each Christmas.
“What we know about physics is that, in one reference frame, distance and time look different than in another,” Silverberg explained. “Time can dilate — get much longer — and space can contract. That’s exactly what you’d need to deliver millions of gifts around the globe on one night.”
Silverberg’s hypothesis — as yet unproven — is that Santa uses his advanced knowledge to wrap his sleigh and eight reindeer in a “relativity cloud.”
“So, inside the cloud a month might go by, but it would only feel like a split-second outside the cloud — for example, in a child’s bedroom,” the expert said. “Santa probably also shrinks and expands the cloud, so he can enter houses through tiny openings.
Photo by mdumlao98.
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