In The New York Times today:  “A winter storm continued its blizzard rage in some parts of the mid-Atlantic region on Saturday morning, dumping nearly two feet of wet, heavy snow that had cut power to about 200,000 residents, collapsed the roof of a private jet hangar at Washington Dulles International Airport and forced the nation’s capital into quiet hibernation.

All postal operations — collection, delivery and retail — in the Washington area, including the Northern Virginia suburbs and suburban Maryland, were canceled on Saturday.

“There is a point where we have to think about the safety of our employees and our customers,” said Patrick Murphy, a United States Postal Service spokesman. “It’s very difficult to move the mail between the plants right now.”

Yet the band of snow that traveled up the coast through New Jersey and southern parts of Staten Island had stopped short of New York City by late morning.

The force of the storm swirled around Washington and its environs, the second powerful weather event in six weeks.

While buses and above-ground subways were closed in the city, it appeared that the District of Columbia would not surpass the 1922 record of 28 inches of snowfall.

“We’re calling for 25 inches, which is still high on the rankings,” said Matthew Kramer, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service in the Baltimore-Washington region.

Mr. Kramer said that an upper low pressure system would dump another four to eight inches on the region before the day was over.

Elkridge, southwest of Baltimore, reported the highest snowfall totals — 32 inches — and counting. Nearby, at the Baltimore Washington International Airport, virtually all flights were canceled.

That was the scene throughout all the area airports, but Dulles Airport suffered the worst of the snow damage.

In a hangar separate from the main terminal at Dulles Airport, one portion of a roof collapsed at 8:15 Saturday morning. “As of this morning, the structural integrity was still in question,” said Courtney Mickalonis, a spokeswoman for the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority, who added that fire crews were on the scene.

She said that some planes were damaged, but there were no injuries to employees,

Some commercial, international flights were still scheduled to leave later Saturday afternoon, but crews were struggling to clear the runways faster than the snow could accumulate, Ms. Mickalonis said. All flights Saturday were canceled at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport, and because they had been canceled by Friday, hardly anyone was in the terminal, Ms. Mickalonis said.

Latest reports have more than 196,000 without power in the region. Pepco, the primary power company in the Washington area, as well as Montgomery and Prince George’s County reported there were 92,000 customers without power, roughly 11 percent. Dominion, another power company, reported 73,827 outages in northern Virginia, (9 percent of all customers). BG&E in Anne Arundel and Howard County in Maryland reported 34,587 customers without power. About 28,484 other customers were out earlier in the storm but have been restored.

The snow storm was so powerful that it sounded more like summer time for some people in its wake. Periodically after midnight in Baltimore, residents trying to sleep were astonished to hear rare winter thunder, as lightning accompanying the blizzard illuminated a landscape already transformed by snow.

Residents awoke Saturday morning to find the heavy snow had bent bushes and small trees low, with some 10-foot evergreens transformed into six-foot mounds of white. Some people plunged into thigh-deep drifts to try to shake the snow off and save the trees before they were permanently distorted or broken.

“There’s plenty of time to dig out this weekend, so take it slow,” Frank Roylance, a science reporter for The Baltimore Sun who blogs on the weather, advised readers Saturday morning. “This is very dense, very heavy snow.“

With big flakes still falling steadily after 9 a.m., Mr. Roylance predicted that the could be the second or third biggest in Baltimore history.

Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake was sworn in as mayor Friday as the first snow flakes began falling. She succeeded fellow Democrat Sheila Dixon, who resigned last week after a plea deal on corruption charges.

Ms. Rawlings-Blake presides over a city with a $100 million deficit that has already been hammered with heavy snowstorms this winter. She said dealing with the snow would be her first priority.

“I am committed to ensuring that Baltimore’s streets are safe and accessible no matter how much snow falls over the weekend,” she told The Baltimore Sun.

Amtrak had canceled many trains in its Northeast corridor from Richmond to New York.

Kirby Barnes was in Union Station, returning from a visit to Connecticut, and trying to get home to Newport News. But trains from Washington to Newport News had been canceled since the storm began on Friday.

“They are telling me might have to go back up to Connecticut,” he said. “There is nothing going south, nothing.”

Dennis Hakemain of Virginia Beach who caught a Greyhound Bus up to Washington on Thursday said he had been stranded for two days after the bus and then his train was canceled.

“I was planning to stay one night, but ended up having to pay another night for a hotel,” Mr. Hakemain said. “I’m hoping to get out today, but they are telling me that It might be late today or Sunday before I can get home.” ”

 Full story in The New York Times.

Here is a video from CNN, showing how bad it is: