Despite heavy snowfalls and near white-out conditions on the roads, towns came prepared into the first major snowstorm of 2017: closing schools and municipal buildings pre-emptively and calling their plowing crews in early to keep roads clear.

Snow didn't start until early morning in southern New London County, but most residents appeared to have taken the advice of emergency management officials and chose to stay home. Town officials reported few vehicles on the roads at mid-morning, with a handful of accidents and cars stuck in the snow.

Joseph Sastre, Groton's director of emergency management, said plows were out pretreating the town's roads with salt and sand before the snow started. Groton closed town offices at 9:30 a.m.

"Everybody was ready for this one," he said. "The hills are always tough. ... Luckily, it appears that most people are staying home, which is helping a lot, reducing the number of accidents. I think they're doing very well under the circumstances. It's coming down pretty fast and they have a lot of territory to cover."

In East Lyme, crews were out plowing the town's 120 miles of roads on Thursday in an "all-out effort" to get ahead of the storm, but the weather posed a challenge with gusts of wind blowing the snow back onto the roads, First Selectman Mark Nickerson said.

He said most people in the region adhered to the warning to stay indoors Thursday, and he expected town services would be back up and running on Friday, which "will be business as usual," Nickerson said. "We have champions in our trucks, and they'll get the job done, as they always do."

Ledyard Public Works Director Steve Maslin said Thursday afternoon that his town, too, had been trying to get ahead of the storm, but the intensity of conditions made it difficult.

"The rate of snowfall has been so high, it's impossible to keep things passable for the average vehicle," he said.

By the early afternoon, crews had been out to remove several limbs that were blocking roads, and there was a downed wire on Meetinghouse Road, which had to be blocked off.

Fortunately, there was little icing on trees and most fallen-branch incidents were wind-related, Maslin noted.

Compared with storms in years past, Maslin said, this one has been a little trickier for his crews.

"It's been a little bit more difficult for the trucks, even fully loaded with salt, to maintain traction," he said. "It's been tough: each storm is a little different; this one has been a little bit harder."

In the morning in North Stonington, the ambulance and fire companies responded to a tractor-trailer that state police said crashed and fell onto its side on Interstate 95.

The town's full highway department crew was put on the roads starting about 6 a.m., and the transfer station was closed to add an extra person onto the plow trucks.

First Selectman Shawn Murphy said they likely would be working into the evening after the snow was expected to stop to make sure the roads were cleared.

Norwich weathered Thursday's snowstorm fairly easily, city officials said, although more than a foot of heavy, wet snow fell on the city accompanied by strong gusting winds, with occasional lightning and thunder.

Public Works Director Ryan Thompson said road crews were busy throughout the day, and it was difficult keeping up with the heavy snow, but no major problem areas developed. Public Works employees did assist a few motorists who were stuck in some spots, he said.

Snow plows continued working after the snow stopped Thursday evening, and Thompson said he expected the road conditions to improve Thursday night.

All garbage collection trucks were pulled off the road by mid-morning by Willimantic Waste Paper Co. Inc., the city's waste collection contractor. Thursday's collection routes will be done on Friday, and Friday's routes will be collected Saturday, Thompson said.

Norwich Public Utilities responded to one brief power outage Thursday afternoon, when a tree fell on power lines at 590 Scotland Road. Trucks responded to the report at 12:18 p.m., and the power of all 357 customers affected was restored by 1:08 p.m.

City Manager John Salomone said he was proud that City Hall remained open throughout the day Thursday, although employees were allowed to use a vacation or personal day if they preferred not to report. The building operated with a skeleton staff.

"We didn't have that many customers, but we did have a few," Salomone said.

In Salem, the Town Hall, library and school were all shut down, but First Selectman Kevin Lyden said the Public Works Department was working hard and had called in a relief driver to help out with plow runs.

"We're doing OK, we've got five plow crews out," he said.

"Our salt shed is full to the brim, it won't be after this storm," he added.

Old Lyme Emergency Management Director David Roberge said in the early afternoon Thursday that the town was making it through the storm with minimal impact.

All of the town's Public Works crews were out, and there hadn't been any flooding or reported structural damage, although a few wires were down — just a heavy snowstorm, he said.

Early Thursday afternoon, Stonington police said they had received no reports of accidents despite the treacherous road conditions. With near white-out conditions on Route 1 because of the blowing snow in the late morning, the high school could not be seen from the police station, which is located only a few hundred feet across Route 1.

Ledyard Mayor Michael Finkelstein said in the afternoon that the town was faring well with the storm. Though roughly 142 people were without power during the day, electricity was restored by early evening, according to Eversource's outage map.

Ledyard police reported no car accidents as of around 6 p.m., just a few vehicles that became stuck or disabled in the snow.

Finkelstein said he was encouraged to see most people were staying off the roads, but would be continuing to monitor weather reports that call for more snow on Saturday.

"We'll see what happens tomorrow," he said.

Day Staff Writers Amanda Hutchinson, Deb Straszheim, Joe Wojtas and Kimberly Drelich contributed to this report.

n.lynch@theday.com