Blades down. Game on.

HOBART | Most people were still sound asleep Tuesday when the city's fleet of 23 snowplows stocked with beet juice and salt hit the city's main roads.

With predictions of up 14 inches of snow over the next couple of days, Public Works Director C. Wayne Snider said he wasn't taken any chances and already had made sure his crews' trucks were prepped with the salt mixture and ready to roll about 3 a.m.

"This is a hard one because it's going to last a long time. Storms like this you get caught up and here it goes again," Snider said of the area winter storm warning issued through 12 p.m. today.

Snider, after getting an anticipated warning call at 2:49 a.m. from a Hobart police watch commander, set off a chain of events that included wake-up calls to his drivers to start their day.

A few hours later, other calls were placed to school officials to coordinate with them about whether classes should cancel or be in session. Classes were held Tuesday in Hobart.

"We're going to be handling five different waves in a 36- to 40-hour periods," Snider said of his department's battle with the elements. The workday includes fitting in other duties such as garbage and recycling pickup.

At 8 a.m. Tuesday, truck operator Dave Pisarski was already five hours into his 12-hour shift. He worked a route along Wisconsin Street, Ridge Road and other main arteries.

"This is my main route," Pisarski said, while heading north on Wisconsin Street to New Chicago's border.

It's during the later morning hours, with the 11-foot blade on his truck down, that Pisarski drives over the same roads, scraping away the freshly fallen snow.

"We try and keep the main streets open," Pisarski said.

Once those streets - the ones leading to fire departments, the hospital, the downtown and U.S. 30 retail area and schools - are open, drivers using smaller trucks will return to clean out the various subdivisions, street department foreman Scott Cummings said.

He said this is the second year his department has used the beet juice mixed with salt and it's proven to be a valuable tool for melting ice on the roads.

He said the mixture can be used in 20 below zero temperatures and is more friendly to the environment because it is biodegradable.

"It's better all the way around," Cummings said.