Baby Lucy arrived Tuesday evening happy and healthy, at 6 pounds and 2 ounces. 
 
 But oh, what a delivery. 
 
 Her mom is Bethany Hojnacki, who lives on Carlyle Avenue in South Buffalo. Bethany went into labor around 7:30 a.m. Tuesday, as the brutal lake effect storm bore down on her neighborhood. 
 
 In milder weather, Bethany and her husband, Jared, would have made a beeline for Mercy Hospital. But Carlyle was largely impassable. When Jared Hojnacki saw firefighters helping a stranded motorist near the house, he tried to enlist the Fire Department’s help for his wife’s cause. 
 
 That’s when the family found its first dose of good fortune. While the roads were hopelessly clogged with snow and cars, the stranded motorist was a labor and delivery nurse who works at Mercy Hospital, according to Deborah Hojnacki, Jared’s mother and the baby’s grandmother. 
 
 The nurse — whom Deborah Hojnacki knew only by her first name, Denise — decided to stay with the pregnant mom until she could be moved to the hospital. 
 
 Hours passed. When word spread through the neighborhood that Bethany was in labor, some of its youngsters hit the street with shovels to try to open a path. But the small army of good Samaritans could not move enough of the several tons of snow choking Carlyle Avenue, Deborah Hojnacki said. 
 
 In the afternoon, a Fire Department vehicle arrived to retrieve Bethany and get her to Mercy Hospital. 
 
 “They didn’t get stuck on Carlyle,’’ Deborah Hojnacki said. 
 
 “They got stuck on Abbott because of all the stranded cars.’’ 
 
 The fire officials went to Plan B. They took Bethany to the fire station at Abbott Road and Hollywood Avenue. A second Mercy Hospital nurse, who also had been stranded, stayed by her side as well. 
 
 Then at 9:31 p.m., Lucy Grace Hojnacki joined the gathering. 
 
 “The baby was born, and she’s healthy,’’ grandmother Hojnacki said. She is Jared and Bethany’s second child; they also have a 19-month-old son. 
 
 Around 45 minutes after Lucy was born, mom and baby were moved in an ambulance the final three-quarters of a mile to Mercy Hospital. It was escorted by two snowmobiles and backed up by a piece of heavy snow-moving equipment, just in case. 
 
 “They just kind of weaved around streets, and up sidewalks to get to the hospital,’’ Deborah Hojnacki said, after talking to her son. 
 
 “We are just very thankful,’’ she said. 
 
 Another area couple also had an interesting birth experience. 
 
 Tom Stuebe was in Colden, separated by miles of snow and a driving ban, when he saw his wife, Heather Stuebe, give birth Wednesday to their baby daughter in Buffalo. 
 
 Around 11 this morning, Beatrice Stuebe was born in The Birthing Center of Buffalo, at 2500 Main St. 
 
 But Tom Stuebe was back home, with the couple’s other children. 
 
 So someone held up a computer tablet in the delivery room to give the Stuebe clan a view – via Skype – of Beatrice’s first breaths. The healthy baby weighed more than 10 pounds, said Dr. Katharine Morrison. 
 
 email: mspina@buffnews.com ||||| A pregnant mother of two died in car crash Monday as she drove herself to the hospital to prepare to deliver her third child — who miraculously survived the wreck. 
 
 Desiree Strout, 28, of Canaan, Maine, was with husband Harry Weeks, 29, and their 8-year-old daughter as they made their way to Redington-Fairview General Hospital on Monday so she could be induced into labor at 9 months pregnant. 
 
 When she was just five miles away from the hospital, she lost control when she struck a patch of black ice, which caused the car to slide off the road, roll and hit frozen snow built up along the side of the road, Chief David Bucknam of the Skowhegan Police Department confirmed to PEOPLE. The vehicle then rolled onto a frozen pond and came to rest on its side. 
 
 Desiree Strout and Harry Weeks Jessica Michael Photography 
 
 When rescue workers and the Skowhegan Fire Department arrived on scene, “the decision was made to pull Desiree to the side of the pond where rescue personnel could give Desiree medical attention as she had stopped breathing,” said Bucknam, specifically praising Officer Christopher Viera and firefighter Jason Front for their heroic efforts. 
 
 Police chief says crash that killed pregnant 27-year-old caused by black ice https://t.co/RD11R05AZJ pic.twitter.com/0mSiMQelbQ — Kennebec Journal (@KJ_Online) January 23, 2018 
 
 Desiree died in the ambulance on the way to the hospital, but her baby boy pulled through and survived after being born via emergency Caesarean section at a local hospital. The Kennebec Journal reported that the baby was in critical condition around noon Monday at Redington-Fairview General Hospital. 
 
 He was later transferred to Eastern Maine Medical Center in Bangor, where a spokesperson declined to comment on the baby’s condition, but released a statement from the family asking for privacy during this “incredibly difficult time.” 
 
 Her husband, Harry Weeks, suffered a lacerated liver, a punctured lung and was listed in critical condition as of Monday, while their daughter has minor injuries, PEOPLE has learned. Their other daughter, who is two-years-old, wasn’t in the car. 
 
 Desiree’s friend from high school, Brandon Blodgett, 28, tells PEOPLE that she was an “amazing mother” who homeschooled her children and loved to teach them things. 
 
 “She had this wicked bubbly personality, and was always so chipper,” he says. “You liked to be around her. She was an amazing mother.” 
 
 RELATED VIDEO: California Mom, 40, Who Competed in Marathons Dies Two Days After Flu Diagnosis 
 
 Blodgett says that the entire community is “in such shock” that she’s gone and that their baby is in critical condition. 
 
 “It’s going to take a long time for Harry to be all right, but I have faith,” he adds. “It’s tragic.” 
 
 Buckman says he will be recognizing both Officer Viera and firefighter Forst “for their quick actions that saved the life of the unborn child.” 
 
 “It was an extremely stressful and emotional morning as Desiree was well known throughout the community as well as her mother working at the hospital Desiree was taken to,” said Bucknam. “I personally would like to express my sincere appreciation to the men and woman of both the Skowhegan Police Department and Fire Department for their quick response and decisive action on scene.”
– Seven people have now died as a result of Buffalo's freak snowstorm, reports AP, but little Lucy Hojnacki provides an antidote to the depressing stat. The Buffalo News recounts her amazing delivery story: When mom Bethany went into labor in their South Buffalo home yesterday morning, dad Jared had no chance of getting her to the hospital through all the snow. He spotted firefighters helping a stranded driver on their street, and that driver just happened to be a labor and delivery nurse. The nurse stayed with Bethany for hours until a Fire Department vehicle successfully navigated their side street, only to find the main road impassable because of abandoned cars. Instead of the hospital, firefighters took Team Hojnacki to the fire station, where a second nurse, also stranded, helped with the delivery at 9:31pm. “The baby was born, and she’s healthy,’’ says grandma Deborah Hojnacki. All finally made it to the hospital later that night. Meanwhile, lots more snow was expected though tonight, on top of the 4 or 5 feet already on the ground in some places, reports the Daily News.