Snow on the way for most of Nebraska after winds and fires Wednesday

Wildfires were reported in Rock County near Bassett and in Sherman County near Ansley Tuesday night and Wednesday morning due to wind gusts that exceeded 50 miles per hour.

But conditions will change in a big way.

Several counties in the northeast part of the state are in a red flag warning for continuing fire danger due to high winds, which is expected to expire at 6 p.m. this evening.

Thursday will bring winter weather. A winter storm watch has been issued for more than a dozen counties in central and western Nebraska, as well as most of the northeast part of the state.

National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Taylor said 4 to 8 inches of snow is expected across parts of the Panhandle and central Nebraska.

The rest of the state could see between an inch to 3 inches of snow.

Travel conditions are expected to deteriorate by Thursday evening, even as snow lets up by 6 p.m. Central. The National Weather Service warns that roads north of Interstate 80 could be especially difficult to traverse.

Highs on Thursday are expected to only be in the 20s and 30s for most of the state.

The cold weather will linger through the weekend before a warmup next week that could have many parts of Nebraska back in the 60s by Tuesday.