Santa has 34 microsec to meet deadlines on Christmas

Melbourne, Dec 4 (UNI) Christmas will unusually be hectic for Santa Claus who has to make his rounds at lightning speed to deliver gifts to all the children on time, a Swedish consultancy has concluded.

The jolly man's route around the planet includes stops at 2.5 billion homes, assuming that children of all religions receive a present, The Australian quoted Anders Larsson of the engineering consultancy Sweco as saying.

''We estimated that there are 48 people per sq km on the Earth, and 20m between each home. So if Santa travels against the Earth's rotation he has 48 hours to deliver all the presents,'' he said.

Father Christmas has long been believed to reside at the North Pole, although a number of northern towns, including Finnish Rovaniemi, claim to be his true home.

But Sweco's report claims that he wouldn't be able to make his round-the-world trip from there in time.

''He has 34 microseconds at each stop to slide down the chimney, drop off the presents, nibble on his cookies and milk and hop back on his sleigh,'' Mr Larsson said.

Santa's reindeer must travel at a speed of 5800km per second to complete the trip on time.

UNI