Warmer than Miami (ignore the rain and wind): St. John's hits 17.9 C on Dec. 10

Santa would be sweating if he visited St. John's in his jolly red suit on Sunday.

Record-breaking temperatures of 17.9 C were recorded at St. John's International Airport.

That's not just a record for the day that's a record for any day on record, ever, in December, says meteorologist Rob Carroll, with the Gander Environment Canada weather office.

"The old record for any point in December was 17.3 set back in 2008 Dec. 13, 2008," Carroll said.

It was so warm in St. John's, in fact, that it even beat the Miami high temperaturefor the day, of 17.8 C.

"But on the flipside, while we were getting heavy rain and high winds they were sunny with just a gentle breeze down there, so still a bit of a difference," Carroll told CBC's St. John's Morning Show.

The warm temperatures hit most of Newfoundland.

"We broke about six temperature records for areas that we keep records for, and they pushed as far west asLa Scie, Burgeo, Badger. Places like that all broke records yesterday," said Carroll.

The warmer-than-usual temperatures were due to what Carroll called a "high-amplitude upper weather pattern across North America" over the last few days. That basically pushed a lot of cold air southinto the U.S., and a lot of warm air further north than usual.

Whatever the reason, people noticed.

But of course, while the temperatures were hitting record highs in parts of Newfoundland, Labrador was getting more typical December weather.

In Wabush on Sunday, the low temperature hit 29.5 C.

Temperatures for the Avalon and southeast coast were dipping by Monday, with a predicted high of 4 C.