Deep in the gut of the Picadilly Mine near Sussex, workers once laid off when potash prices shrank, are back underground, trying to keep up with the soaring demand for road salt to be spread on New Brunswick highways this cold and icy winter.
Veteran miners, including those who left the Sussex area of southern New Brunswick for other jobs, have returned to work 10 and 12-hour shifts nearly one kilometre below the Earth’s surface, in a moonscape world of industry that many thought had long ago been shuttered.
The ride to work is a two-minute descent in an industrial elevator that drops at a rate of 1,500 feet per minute or about half a kilometre per minute.
When the doors open, the view is breathtaking. It feels like stepping onto the dark side of a rocky planet that sparkles in the head lamps.
The glint and shimmer everywhere — the white crystals floating in space — are caused by the dust of salt-mining.
“We can’t make it fast enough,” said Doug Doney, general manager of the mine.
“We’ve already set a record for February for volume sold. It will be the highest month ever. We’ll be over 100,000 tonnes this month.”
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