Thousands of flights were delayed and canceled throughout the nation on Wednesday as a severe winter storm impacts the northern and western United States.

Heavy snowfall and freezing rain are expected to impact much of the nation for the next three days, according to a forecast from the National Weather Service. Powerful winds are expected in the western United States, as well as heavy rains and flash flooding in the midwest.

“A prolonged major winter storm will spread a large swath of heavy snow from the West Coast to the Northeast today through Friday, and confidence is high that this winter storm will be extremely disruptive to travel, infrastructure, livestock, and recreation in affected areas,” the National Weather Service said on social media.

The weather conditions have produced more than 2,000 flight cancellations and over 9,800 delays on Wednesday, according to data from FlightAware. Some 44% of flights were canceled at Minneapolis-Saint Paul International Airport, while 33% were canceled at Milwaukee Mitchell International Airport, and 23% at Detroit Metropolitan Wayne County Airport.

Several airlines issued flight waivers for affected airports, allowing passengers to rebook their tickets without an additional charge. Southwest Airlines, which canceled some 16,700 flights between December 21 and December 31 even as severe winter weather subsided in the days after Christmas, nixed flights on Wednesday at a rate commensurate with other major carriers. The airline is permitting customers to rebook tickets if they planned to depart from cities such as Minneapolis, Detroit, Grand Rapids, Milwaukee, Portland (Maine), Salt Lake City, and Denver.

The winter storm that struck the United States amid the holiday season caused companies like FedEx and UPS to warn of nationwide delivery delays. Amazon shuttered some locations, and the United States Postal Service closed several dozen offices. Nearly 102 million Americans planned to drive to their holiday destinations, marking an increase of two million drivers since the previous year, according to data from AAA.

The Minnesota Department of Transportation warned travelers this week that the snowstorm will produce hazardous driving conditions. “Plows will be out in force and will work diligently to keep roads open,” District 8 Operations Superintendent Lonnie Hoffman said in a statement. “However, folks should consider changing travel plans and be prepared that roadways could quickly move to no travel advised or closed as two storm fronts move across the area.”

Even as much of the nation prepares for severe weather, the eastern United States will see “significantly anomalous warm temperatures” relative to typical conditions in February. The National Weather Service forecasted highs between Wednesday and Thursday will venture into the 70s and 80s in the southeast, midwest, and mid-Atlantic regions, adding that the weather “will feel more like June than February.”

California, meanwhile, is facing strong winds that may bring snow to low-elevation portions of the state; Daniel Swain, a climate scientist at the University of California Los Angeles, said on social media that almost all of the state’s population will “be able to see snow from some vantage point later this week.” On the other hand, more than 106,000 homes and businesses in California were without power as of Wednesday, according to data from PowerOutage.us.

Actor Liam Neeson said he was offered the chance to play James Bond back in the 1990s, but he turned it down when his wife gave him an “ultimatum.”

The 70-year-old actor recalled how producer Barbara Broccoli reached out to him several times regarding the role just after Neeson was nominated for an Academy Award for his portrayal of Oskar Schindler in “Schindler’s List” (1993). But the Hollywood star explained how love trumped career in this case.

“I know the Broccolis. They looked at a bunch of actors,” Neeson told Rolling Stone during an interview published on February 20. 

“‘Schindler’s List’ had come out and Barbara [Broccoli] had called me a couple of times to ask if I was interested, and I said, ‘Yes, I would be interested.’ And then my lovely wife [Natasha Richardson], God rest her soul, said to me while we were shooting ‘Nell’ down in the Carolinas, ‘Liam, I want to tell you something: If you play James Bond, we’re not getting married.’”

The actor said he would tease Richardson by “going behind her back, making my fingers as though I’m holding a gun, and [humming the James Bond theme].” 

“I loved doing that s***!” he said about poking fun at his wife, who died in 2009 due to a head injury while skiing.

“She gave me a James Bond ultimatum,” Neeson recalled of turning down the part. “And she meant it! Come on, there’s all those gorgeous girls in various countries getting into bed and getting out of bed. I’m sure a lot of her decision-making was based on that!”

Though the actor never took a turn portraying Bond, he did make a name for himself in the action series “Taken,” which brought Neeson a huge amount of recognition in the genre.

In the movie, Neeson threatens his daughter’s kidnappers by saying, “I don’t know who you are. I don’t know what you want. If you are looking for ransom I can tell you I don’t have money, but what I do have are a very particular set of skills. Skills I have acquired over a very long career. Skills that make me a nightmare for people like you. If you let my daughter go now that’ll be the end of it. I will not look for you, I will not pursue you, but if you don’t, I will look for you, I will find you and I will kill you.”

The actor recently discussed how he initially found his well-known speech in the 2008 film “corny.”

“I certainly did sound scary, but I thought it was corny,” Neeson told Vanity Fair during a February interview. “It was a cornball. I really did feel that. It’s nice to be proven wrong.”

The speech has become one of the most quoted in recent movie history.