Power outages in parts of the Halifax region are being blamed on a combination ofsea spray and fog.

Parts of Dartmouth, Eastern Passage and Cow Bay were without power Thursday morning. There were also brief disruptions overnight in Halifax, similar to the outages that plagued parts of the province Wednesday morning.

NovaScotia Power blames the problem on sea spray from last weekend's windstorm. The saltcoated parts of the grid, and the humid weather rolled in and short-circuited the system.

Josef Yeremian, an engineering consultant from Ontario, says the problem can be prevented by sealing equipment.

"The other thing is regular maintenance removing the salt from these electrical components," said Yeremian, president of Thermodyne Engineering.

Once the buildup starts causing problems, Yeremian said, workers can try to brush it off or shut down that part of the system and rinse it with water.

Crews are cleaningequipment that have salt buildup on them, says a spokesman for Nova Scotia Power.

Margaret Murphy says this combination of weather in the province is extremely rare and hasn't happened in Metro Halifax for decades.

"It's acting as a conductor for a short period of time," she said. "It's annoying. We'd rather get rid of it, but once it happens it corrects itself and then the crews go out."