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A warm air mass pushed across Eastern Canada on Thursday, delivering the hottest Christmas Eve on record to cities across Ontario.

“I’ve been in this business over 40 years and I’m shaking my head over it,” said David Phillips, a senior climatologist with Environment Canada. “This is just unbelievable.”

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Toronto saw a high of 15.4 C early in the morning, breaking a 1964 record by three degrees to be the warmest day in the city since 1840, when meteorologists started tracking temperatures downtown. The average for Dec. 24 in Toronto is -1 C.

Phillips said spike in temperatures can be attributed primarily to the strongest El Nino in decades — caused by a warmer surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean.

“If it feels like El Niño, it looks like El Niño, guess what? It probably is El Niño,” he said. “This super El Niño, the Godzilla of El Niños.”

In Ottawa, the high hit 16.7 C, making it the second hottest day ever recorded there in December, Environment Canada said.