Salt shortage leaves Halifax-area residents unarmed against deep freeze

Halifax is dealing with a salt shortage amid snow and ice problems.

In and around the Halifax Regional Municipality, salt has become white gold.

Stores throughout the city ran out of road salt over the weekend after several days of wet, freezing weather.

“There is no salt,” said Cole harbour resident, Donald Bungay. “Everybody in this neighbourhood that I have talked to have all run out. Some people went and bought salt for your freshwater, which is very expensive.”

Bungay and his son made the rounds looking for more salt after using the last of theirs but came up empty-handed.

“There’s none available in metro as far as I know,” said hardware store manager Paul Conrod on Sunday. “Every second phone call is looking for salt or sand, anything to put on ice to melt it.”

Bungay said he checked everywhere he could think of, including Home Depot, Canadian Tire and Walmart. With back-to-back storms hitting the area Thursday and Sunday, everyone is sold out, leaving residents to pound and chip their way through ice as thick as 10 centimetres in some spots.

“This is the second time in three days that we’re cleaning out probably two, three, four inches of ice from our driveway,” said local resident Dor Arie.

Many stores in HRM are closed Monday for family day. With no deliveries on the way, Conrod said he doesn’t expect to have any salt on his shelves when he reopens Tuesday.

For more Nova Scotia news, visit our dedicated provincial page