A winter storm will begin to coat Chicago, Illinois, and the neighboring area with one inch of snow per hour Friday night into Saturday. The northeastern part of Illinois is under a level four winter storm threat from the National Weather Service.

The NWS warned that travelers should consider delaying travel unless it's "absolutely necessary," with driving expected to be very difficult to impossible.

Forecasters are anticipating a winter storm to begin late Friday, with snow expected to fall up to an inch per hour into Saturday.

CHICAGO - Today is rainy and foggy to start. Temperatures will be in the low to mid 50s. The rain will dwindle to drizzle with drier conditions on the way this afternoon. Tonight, it gets chilly with temperatures dipping into the mid 30s.

Accumulating snow is likely over the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, but there are still questions as to how much snow the Chicago area will see. The approaching storm system remained about 1,000 miles off the coast of the Pacific Northwest as of Wednesday morning,

The trip home from Thanksgiving for millions of travelers in the central U.S. will be disrupted by a "significant winter storm," forecasters said.