Frederick officials have two words for residents as snowfall totals approach 30 inches: Stay home.

Crews have been hard at work since Friday night trying to clear snow emergency routes, but it hasn't been easy, said Marc Stachowski, acting deputy director of operations for Frederick city.

"It's a mess," Stachowski said. "People need to stay home. That's the bottom line."

Mayor Randy McClement (R) declared a snow emergency effective 8 p.m. Friday, which requires residents to remove their cars from snow emergency routes and avoid driving on those routes as much as possible.

McClement strongly urged residents to stay off the roads as snow removal crews do the best they can in the face of a storm that promises to keep them plowing through Saturday evening.

"It's as good as its going to be," he said. "It's hard for everybody to keep up with."

The city's public works staff have been working in 12-hour-shifts and have been using about 20 large plow trucks, 15 small plow trucks and three loader and other backhoe support vehicles to battle the storm, which began dumping the bulk of its damage on the city around 7 p.m. Friday, Stachowski said.

"I'd say that we're doing pretty good, actually, considering it's still snowing," Stachowski said. "We're beating it back, but we got Mother Nature we're working with, and the best we can do is try keep up with her."

Fresh off a tour of the city's emergency routes on Saturday morning, Stachowski said crews were having success in clearing snow emergency routes and major streets, but streets were far from ready for motorists.

"I would not say they're passable with automobiles," Stachowski said. "We really don't need anyone downtown sightseeing. They really just need to hang tight and let this thing blow over."

Even the city's plow trucks were having a hard time pushing the snow in the early morning hours Saturday, he said, requiring them to go back and add chains to their tires. Sidewalk and shovel crews are also on deck, but Stachowski said they can't do much until the roads are plowed, he said.

There have been reports of trees down in the city, Stachowski said, and crews have been cutting fallen trees down off wires to ensure emergency vehicle passage. In the last six hours, there have been two calls of emergency vehicles needing to get through snow emergency routes. The emergencies weren't major, he said, but involved people who needed to go to the hospital for one reason or another.

"The fewer of those we have to respond to, the more we can focus onto the roads," he said. "Not only are we trying to keep open the city streets, we have to keep our trucks dug out."

Thousands without power

About 2,600 homes in Frederick County were without power Saturday morning, and by 9 a.m. all of Allegheny Power emergency crews were out working to fix the problem, said company spokesman David Neurohr.

Two thousand of the outages are concentrated in the Frederick city area while the rest were spread throughout the county. Because of rough road conditions, Neurohr was not sure how long it would take to turn the electricity back on at all of the affected homes.

"All of our crews are out there, and they are working to fix this," he said. "It is going to be sporadic and we will continue working throughout the day to get it back up."

The heavy branches and electrical wires snapped by fallen trees caused most of the outages, Neurohr said.

Altogether, Frederick County has not been hit as badly as other areas. The number of homes without power is about 3 percent of Allegheny' Frederick County customers. In some Pennsylvania areas, about 35 to 40 percent of homes were left without electricity, he said.

"I know this is probably not comforting to people who don't have power right now," he said. "But this is a pretty devastating storm. It is quite challenging."

Hospital 'doing pretty good'

The heavy snow and rough roads posed some challenges to staff at Frederick Memorial Hospital, but thanks to the help of volunteer drivers and a couple of additional vehicles, services were not affected, said John Veltri, the safety and security director at the hospital.

"We are about an hour behind, but ... we are doing pretty good," he said.

While it takes a little longer for ambulances to get around, the hospital has not had problems getting to patients or bringing in staff to work, he said. Ambulances are receiving driving help from the Frederick County Fire and Rescue Service and a couple of Humvee trucks provided by the National Guard, he said.

The hospital is also using two four-wheel vehicles, Veltri said. "For the most part the ambulances are making it," he said. "It's just slower this time."

Crews from the hospital's plant operations have been out since 10 p.m. shoveling the driveways and entrances. The hospital is also getting help from 12 volunteer drivers, who called in before the storm, he said.

"Our volunteer drivers have been doing great," Veltri said. "The system works like clockwork. ... We had drivers who spent the night."

By 4 a.m., volunteer drivers were already on the road bringing in staff to work or taking patients back home, Veltri said.

"For us it's basically a regular day," he said. "It just takes more resources, more people."

No accidents, few towings

The Frederick Police Department has responded to no reports of accidents or other snow-related emergencies, said Capt. Kevin Grubb, deputy chief of police.

He said the department has only towed two cars from snow emergency routes, compared with 50 cars towed on Dec. 19, which was the last snow emergency declaration in the city.

But this is no ordinary storm, officials said, and residents should bear in mind they still have about 12 hours until they can begin to transform the city back to normal.

McClement said this is the kind of storm that will have to go beyond plowing and melting.

"This is the kind of snow, that when it finally stops snowing, we're going to have to bring in dozers to take it away," he said. "Which is the most expensive way to do it, but you have to do what you have to do."

Chip Jewell, director of the Frederick County emergency communications center, said no serious accidents have been reported. "Hopefully people are staying off the roads," Jewell said. "We've been pretty good."

Maryland State Police said they are mostly responding to drivers who have become stuck in the snow.