By DAVE DOMESCIK | Staff Writer

PELHAM – Before his big night, Santa Claus will visit the families of Pelham on Christmas Eve with the assistance of he Pelham Fire Department.

The city of Pelham has announced the official Santa Stops for the 2024 holidays, with all stops being conducted on Christmas Eve.

Mike Reid, the Pelham fire chief, provided an update on how many stops will be performed this year.

“We have a total of 142 stops this year,” Reid said. “New locations are Church of Christ instead of Southern Pines Chiropractic on Pelham Parkway and we moved from Walker Way at Stonehaven Trail to Walker Way at Stonehaven Way.”

While performing the Santa Stops is an arduous task, Reid added that the creation of the program was to make the task even more manageable.

“We started Santa Stops in 2013 to help reduce the amount of time and travel we had been doing in years previous,” Reid said. “Before starting the Santa Stops, we would drive Santa on every street in the city, and it would take eight to 10 hours per engine company because our city had grown so much.”

The work for the event is split as evenly as possible between the Pelham Fire Department.

“We’ve stayed pretty consistent over the years with around 25-30 stops per station territory, and there are five fire station territories,” Reid said.

Reid also gave details on the general logistics of the event.

“We have eight minutes allotted for each stop,” Reid said. “We will try to keep a live update on Facebook. Because most of the stops are at night, we have our emergency lights on so that we are visible to any traffic in the area.”

A visit from Santa Claus is always magical, but a visit from the big man hours before Christmas makes it that much more special.

“We help Santa spread Christmas cheer and make sure Santa’s list is up to date for all of the children,” Reid said. “It’s a time of fellowship, to meet and spread Christmas cheer to all of our residents and make sure our children have a magical time.”

For more information on the 2024 Pelham Santa Stops, visit the Pelham Fire Department Facebook page at Facebook.com/pelhamalabamafire.