(CNN) The smoke of fires Canada’s forests are approaching parts of the central United States and could persist for the next few days, weather and health officials warned Thursday.

Air quality alerts were issued early Friday in several states, including Nebraska, Washington, Montana and Wisconsin, along with a special weather report on air quality in Wyoming.

The heaviest concentrations of smoke will move east and west-central throughout the day and affect major metropolitan areas such as Chicago, Indianapolis and St. Louis.

Canada has had a fairly active start to the fire season. Last week, devastating wildfires in Alberta burned 150 times more area in the province than in the past five years combined, CNN reported.

In Nebraska, smoke from the Canadian wildfires will drift through the region Friday through Saturday morning, “causing potentially hazardous air quality and poor visibility in eastern Nebraska and Iowa. Limit activities outdoors, if possible, when air quality deteriorates,” the National Weather Service in Omaha tweeted Thursday.

Smoke from the wildfires is “beginning to move through the greater Lincoln and Omaha areas,” the service’s Omaha office said Friday afternoon. “Visibility is expected to drop to 1.5 – 3 km in the next few hours, and air quality will enter the unhealthy range for sensitive groups.”

In Douglas County in eastern Nebraska, which includes Omaha, the health department warned that smoke could linger through Saturday.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Air Quality Index indicated that parts of the Rocky Mountains, Great Plains and Midwest, including parts of Nebraska and the northeast corner of the State, had “very unhealthy” air quality on Friday.

CNN’s Dave Hennen contributed to this report.