Journal Timex's Journal: When engineers think too much about Christmas 5
I wish I could take credit for this... It showed up in my mailbox about ten years ago.
What Happens When Engineers think too much about Christmas...
- No known species of reindeer can fly. But there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not completely rule out flying reindeer, which only Santa has seen.
- There are 2 billion children (under 18) in the world. But since Santa doesn't appear to handle Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, and Jewish children, that reduces the work load to 15% of the total - 378 million or so. At an average rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each.
- Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with thanks to time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west. This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining gifts under the tree, eat the snacks, get back up the chimney, get back in the sleigh, and move on to the next house. Assuming that each of these 91.8 million homes are distributed evenly (which we know to be false but for the sake of these calculations we will accept) we are now talking about
- The sleigh's payload adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium sized LEGO set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons not counting Santa, who is inexorably described as overweight. On land, a conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that "flying reindeer" (see point one) could pull TEN TIMES the usual amount, we can not do the job with 8 or even 9, we need 214,000 reindeer. This increases the weight, not even counting the sleigh, to 353,430 tons. Again for comparison this is 4 times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth 2.
[Update: I sent this to my sister, who shared it with an Engineer friend of hers. He had this to say:
"I hate to add another level of complexity to Santa's flight, but we must also take into account the reduction in the payload as Santa brings each little brat his or her Lego set. Additionally, we will need to figure in the additional weight that Santa is adding when cramming fat-loaded cookies and dairy drinks into his head. This brings up another point...with all of that junk food throughout the evening, shouldn't a couple of pit stops at restrooms be figured in to #3 above? This will also cause fluctuations in the payload. Hey, I'm not saying it can't be done... if Corporate says we can can do it, we can do it... "
I thought it apropos.]
- 353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance. This will heat the reindeer in the same manner as a spacecraft re-entering the earths atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.2 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each. In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the next pair of reindeer, and creating deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousands of a second. Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times the force of gravity. A 300 pound Santa would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.
- Conclusion: There was a Santa, but he's dead now...and to all a good night!
3 things you missed (Score:2)
2. You overlooked the transplantation to Japan of American Culture, which increases his workload a few million but also extends his night, with rotation, to nearly 40 hours.
3. There is the possibility that his sleigh moves faster than light, and thus backwards in time in accordance with the theory of relativity.
Re: (Score:1)
It may run in families, but it's not guaranteed. The presumption is that there's at least one good child per family, thereby necessitating a stop.
I didn't overlook anything, as I didn't write this. (I admitted so much on t
Another one /... (Score:2)
This is a really really wrong asumption, and increases the workload by several ORDERS of magnitude. The absolute WORST-CASE scenario is an even distribution. Anything that is less than even speeds up his visits. For example, an apartment bu
Tsk, Tsk (Score:2)
Merry Christmas to you too!
Re: (Score:1)
Please. Everybody knows that Santa makes use of a quantum mechanical wormhole in the spacetime continuum.
Merry Christmas to you too!
I think there's more to that than you think. Consider: Santa is apparently ageless. He manages to supply a huge amount of toys and goodies for a large number of children (and many adults).
The only logical explanation is that Santa figured out a long time ago how to make Time stand still. Whilst the rest of the Universe is completely unaware, Santa is taking his own sweet time, going from house to house. The first-hand account in "'Twas the Night Before Christmas" is made possible because the time envel