It's The Busiest Mail Delivery Day Of The Year

BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- It's a good time to be in the delivery business. In fact, the US Postal Service says this is the busiest delivery day of the year.

Derek Valcourt explains the challenge postal workers are facing Monday.

All those packages have to get there by Christmas, right? So postal workers have been scrambling Monday. Their trucks are full and their shifts are long.

Mailman Gerard Young has a lot to take with him Monday---and this is already his second run of the day. Not only does he have to deliver the usual mail, loaded with plenty of Christmas cards, but this time, he's got packages. Lots of them.

"I've been doing this for 34 years, so I'm used to it," he said. "This year, it's a lot of packages. Packages have really increased."

Every day, mail carriers like Young deliver hundreds of packages. In fact, the US Postal Service says their army of mailmen will deliver about 30 million packages on Monday alone, for a total of about 600 million between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That's up 15% over last year.

"I believe it. I've never seen that many packages before since I've been in the postal service, but we're tackling it. We're dealing with it," Young said.

"Sending a lot of gifts," said Nancy Farmer.

Farmer is one of the millions counting on those deliveries; she shipped her packages out days ago.

"I hope so. It's supposed to get there tomorrow," she said.

To get it all done, some mail carriers are working longer hours and even working Sundays. Gerard Young says in a way, carrying his sack and delivering gifts makes him feel like Santa---and he's almost always greeted with a smile.

"Sometimes people are working and looking out the door. They say, `Oh, I just happened to be at the door' and I know they're waiting for me but that's okay," he said.

If you want a package delivered by Christmas, you're running out of time. It will have to go Priority Mail Express by Wednesday.

Add in all the Christmas cards and the usual mail and the postal service expects to deliver 15 billion pieces of mail throughout the entire holiday season.