Christmas may be more than a week away but for the merry elves of NORAD, now is no time for rest.

“It’s a whirlwind — it just goes by so fast,” said Canadian Army Maj. Andrew Hennessy of the NORAD Tracks Santa mission, set to commence Dec. 24 as it has ever year since 1955.

Months of prep are involved, Hennessy said, most of it planning to fire up the the Santa-tracking app, readying the website and setting up phone lines capable of handling the sheer volume of calls NORAD will receive on Christmas Eve day — nearly 140,000 last year alone.

The complexity of the mission has grown since that fateful Christmas Eve in 1955, when an advertisement from a downtown department store prominently published in The Gazette offered children the chance to call Santa — at the wrong number. Instead of Santa, children got Col. Harry Shoup, who was watching for an attack in a military command center.

Shoup assured the child he was Santa and the rest is history.

Now the mission boasts a staff of 1,500 volunteers, most with military ties, who take two-hour shifts, manning phones from 4 a.m. through midnight on Christmas Eve to accommodate multiple time zones.

Past VIP volunteers have included President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump last year, former President Barack Obama and his family during his time in office, and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in 2016.

“We open the phone lines, they start ringing, and the phones don’t stop until we close the trunk at midnight,” Hennessy said. “It’s nonstop. You take the first call, hang up, the phone will ring again.

“You don’t plan to take any breaks after you start. Once you’re in the chair, you’re in. You’ve got kids from all over the world calling in.”

Most calls involve telling children from around the world that Santa is nigh — something like, “Hey, listen, Santa is going to be at your house in the next hour, so you need to go to bed or else Santa’s not going to come to your house,’” Hennessey said.

“I’ve literally heard the phone drop on the floor and parents pick up and be like, ‘Can I call you again tomorrow? He’s never gone to bed that quickly in his life.’”

These days, the mission entails more than relaying Santa’s position via phone. Keeping up with times, it includes a website in eight languages with 2D and 3D maps, social media updates, and the ability to ask OnStar and Amazon’s Alexa where Santa is. All told, it reaches millions of children annually.

“It’s a full day,” Hennssey said. “It’s intense. But it’s really light-hearted, and I think everyone who kicks-off their Christmas break with participating in this program walks away with a big smile on their face.

“It’s also very effective, having my daughter and being able to tell her, ‘We work with Santa, so you need to be good — I have a direct line to the big guy,’” he added with a chuckle.