(Adds updated numbers for power outages, details from Nova Scotia)
By Darren Calabrese
HALIFAX, Nova Scotia, Jan 4 (Reuters) - More than 80,000 customers were hit by power outages in the Canadian province of Nova Scotia on Thursday evening, leaving parts of the city of Halifax in the dark, as eastern Canada was battered by a massive storm arriving from the United States.
More than 85,000 customers were affected in Nova Scotia as of 6 p.m. EST, according to data from the Nova Scotia Power utility website.
Most departing and arriving flights were also cancelled or delayed at Halifax Stanfield airport.
In Montreal, 85 flights were cancelled on Thursday because of snowstorms affecting airports in Canada's so-called "Maritime" provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island and through much of the eastern United States, an airport spokeswoman said.
"For the Maritimes, it is a cocktail of precipitation and strong winds," Environment Canada meteorologist Jean-Philippe Begin said by telephone.
Parts of Nova Scotia were pummeled with winds of around 100 kilometres (62 miles) per hour and heavy rain, according to a notice by Environment Canada. The storm closed schools and businesses in Nova Scotia, while downing road signs and littering streets in Halifax with tree limbs and other debris.
Working in the pelting rain, Halifax resident David Harris used a chain saw on Thursday evening to help remove parts of an entire tree that had fallen on a neighbor's house, obstructing the entrance.
The fast-developing storm has been dubbed by forecasters as a "weather bomb," a "bombogenesis" or "bomb cyclone." Through Friday, as much as 45 centimetres (17.72 inches) of snow is expected in parts of New Brunswick, while more than 50 centimetres (20 inches) of snow could be dumped on the eastern tip of the Gaspe Peninsula in the province of Quebec, according to Environment Canada.