Chicago Weather: Snow forecast for Saturday; Winter Storm Warning issued for city, suburbs

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Saturday, April 27, 2019

CHICAGO (WLS) -- Parts of the Chicago area are bracing for several inches of wet, slushy snow as a late winter storm moves in on the last weekend in April.

WATCH: Latest ABC7 AccuWeather Forecast

A Winter Storm Watch has been issued for Boone, De Kalb, Ogle and Winnebago counties from 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday and for Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, and McHenry counties from 1 p.m. Saturday to 1 a.m. Sunday. A Winter Storm Warning has been issued for Lake and McHenry counties in Illinois from 1 p.m. to 11 p.m. Saturday, and Kenosha, Racine and Walworth counties in Wisconsin from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Saturday.

ABC7 meteorologist Larry Mowry said precipitation will begin falling as rain between 9 and 11 a.m. Saturday morning. Through the afternoon hours, the rain will change over to snow, mainly for areas along and north of I-80 as temperatures dip into the 30s and 40s. Winds will gust up to 40 mph.

Within the Winter Storm Watch area, there will be a swath of heavy snow with accumulations ranging from 4 to 8 inches.

If O'Hare sees more than 2.2 inches of snow from this system, it will be the greatest snowfall on record this late in the season.

A historic mid-April storm dropped as many as eight inches of snow on parts of the Chicago area less than two weeks ago. Woodstock received 8.5 inches of snow and 5.4 inches of snow fell at O'Hare on April 14.

WATCH: Brookfield Zoo animals enjoy April snow

Brookfield Zoo animals enjoyed the spring snow storm on Sunday.