AMES, Iowa -- The Iowa Department of Transportation is going through a lot of salt and sand this winter.
"We've got about 220,000 tons of capacity across the state. We're probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 175,000 to 180,000 tons of material spread" says DOT Winter Operations Administrator Craig Bargfrede.
He says the kind of winter storms we've seen recently are the hardest for roads crews to deal with, and also use up a lot of salt and sand.
"When you have mixed precipitation of rain, snow, and ice and air and pavement are right around the freezing mark you're always dealing with the issue of a quick freeze--black ice and situations like that. Pavements can freeze really fast on you" Bargfrede says.
Bargfrede says they're above the five-year average for salt and sand use so far this winter.
He also says more salt is on it's way to Iowa.