Marylanders were shocked to see empty shelves and lines stretching far into aisles at grocery stores on Thursday night as shoppers attempted to finish errands and grab last-minute items ahead of a major weekend snowstorm.

The snow event, which starts as early as Saturday afternoon, is expected to dump between 11 and 13 inches of snow and ice on the region. But the National Weather Service has issued a cold weather advisory for Central Maryland starting Friday night through Saturday morning.

Essential items like water ran low on shelves or were completely gone days ahead of the winter storm, while paper products were picked over but stayed stocked at many stores.

Lines were long and carts were full at Mount Washington’s Whole Foods on Friday morning.

“Oh, this is the line!” one person said after rolling their cart past several aisles.

Some shoppers strategized — they held spaces in line while others shopped. Some waited up to 20 minutes before reaching the cashier. One grocery store worker pulled out their phone and took a photo of the line.

“I’m going to send this to my co-worker who isn’t here today,” they told a reporter. “Like, ‘Are you sure you don’t want to come in?’”

The popular Trader Joe’s in Towson was packed on Thursday afternoon. Lines were abnormally long, and the store was out of milk and a variety of beef and poultry.

“It’s because of the snow” was a common sentiment shared among customers at stores across the Baltimore region.

Among the frenzy were people shopping as they normally would but adding a few items specifically for the storm, shoppers told The Banner on Thursday.

This weekend’s heavy snow will be Grayce Heinemann’s first “adult storm,” she said. The New Jersey native shopped at Target in Canton on Thursday with her friend Tori Contois, who is originally from Florida.

Both heard about the potential for a power outage and more than a foot of snow. Pushed by their families to stock up and prepare, they wanted to grab items like water, peanut butter, jelly, frozen chicken nuggets and fruit.

“One of our necessities was iced coffee, in case our Nespresso didn’t work in case we lose power for a little bit,” Heinemann said.

They described their cart as “the bare minimum for survival.”

Sierra Myles from Baltimore headed to Harris Teeter in Canton on Thursday night to pick up some ingredients for the spaghetti she planned to make. She went shopping the day before, but forgot a few things and headed back for a quick pickup.

She and her mother, Cynthia Myles, made sure to grab a couple of extras like bread and milk in preparation for the storm.

In the last open hour of the Waverly Ace Hardware store in Baltimore on Thursday evening, a healthy line of people largely stocked up on salt and shovels.

Two pallets were still piled with a natural sidewalk salt, right in the middle of the store. A temporary display with multiple sizes of shovels greeted entering customers.

Snow is expected to start Saturday evening between 8 p.m. and midnight, said Anna Stuck, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service’s Baltimore/Washington office. The Baltimore area could see between 11 and 13 inches, she said, and snow could pile as high as 15 inches north of the city.

Gov. Wes Moore declared a state of preparedness, activating the Department of Emergency Management to get ready for snowy and icy conditions.

Banner Visuals Director Ariel Zambelich contributed to this story.