Warmup To Near Record Temps On Friday

CHICAGO (CBS) -- The day after Chicago set a "snowless" record, the area is expected to experience near-record high temperatures.

On Wednesday, Chicago broke a 73-year-old record for consecutive days without an inch of snow falling in one calendar day (320).

On Friday, the high temperature could hit 60 degrees, threatening the record of 61 set way back in 1880.

However, the warm temperatures come with a catch. Heavy rain is expected to start falling on Thursday afternoon, part of a surge of warm, moist air moving up from the Gulf of Mexico.

So far this winter, Chicago has had a total of 1.3 inches of snow. The most snow for a single winter was 105.1 inches at Antioch during the winter of 1978-1979, according to state climatologist Jim Angel.

After the warmup, temperatures will fall back into the 20s on Sunday with a chance of snow.