With only a few days left in the year, December is on track to be one of the warmest ever in Chicago.
This month is close to taking fourth place for warmest Decembers on record, said Gino Izzi, meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
December of 2015 is currently the fourth warmest on record, with an average temperature of 39 degrees.
“Based on the forecast, we’re going to end up very close to that year,” Izzi said. “Typically for December the average is 30.5 degrees, so this year it’ll be 8, almost 9 degrees, above normal.”
This year is also currently tied for fifth place for having the least snow in December.
The big driving factor for the unseasonably warm weather has been El Niño, an episodic warming of waters in the eastern and western Pacific that affects weather across the globe, Izzi said. December of 2015 also had a very strong El Niño.
The highest temperature recorded Monday was 59 degrees at O’Hare Airport. The hottest Christmas on record was in 1982, when the high was 64.
Only seven Christmases were 50 degrees or higher since 1871, according to WGN meteorologist Tom Skilling.
Monday broke the record for the warmest low temperature on Christmas Day in history, Izzi said. The city hit a low temperature of 50 degrees — beating the previous record by 4 degrees.
Despite the warm weather this month, residents should expect a return to typical Chicago winter conditions and normal temperatures in January.
“When we go back to average, it’s going to feel pretty dang cold outside,” Izzi said.
