Quote:
Originally Posted by gt350mike
I just got off the phone with my wife (I'm in Williamsburg, VA & she's in Huntsville, AL) and she told me there was a "run" on fuel in Alabama and some gas stations ran out of gas. But don't worry about the gas stations.....they raised the !@#* price .40 to .50 per gallon before they ran out! I've been told that the prices have only increased about .15 to .20 here in Williamsburg for gas, and diesel is as high as $4.49.
I guess a big "THANK YOU" needs to go out to the f'ng media for blowing Ike way out of proportion (I was hearing that Ike was going to be "at least a 4") and another shout out needs to go to the oil companies for fanning the flames. I do realize that the oil rigs had to be evacuated and it may take some time for them to go back on-line, but I don't recall availability of fuel and/or price gouging being an issue with previous hurricanes. Is the Southeast experiencing fuel supply issues because Ike hit Houston directly or is there another issue(s) that is driving this problem???
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Put the blame where it belongs, and that is not on the "big, bad ole oil companies". I have no idea what you mean by fanning the flames but I'm pretty sure it is wrong.
The oil rigs are not a cause of your gas prices or supply problem.
There are a whole bunch of REFINERIES in the hurricane path and most of them had to be shut down to ensure the worker's safety. The refineries in that area can make up to 8 million gallons of fuel a day (each). If they shut down 5 or 6 refineries to try and keep employees from getting hurt or killed, then that is not fanning the flames. It is common sense.
Besides it's a moot point, with all the electrical outages in that area even if the refineries decided to try and keep running they would have been knocked down in an uncontrollable manner when they lost electricity, and that is even more dangerous. Bad things can happen when you pull the plug on heaters and reactors all the sudden.
It usually takes 3 to 7 days to get one back up and fully operational and on test if it's shut down in a controlled manner, which takes about 24 hours. if it gets hit by a sudden power outage it can take up to a month to get one fully operational again.
When the refineries shut down that created a temporary fuel shortage until fuel can be re-routed by pipeline to that area. In the meantime,
THE GAS STATION OWNERS AND OPERATORS saw a chance to cash in and jacked up their prices. Not the oil companies, the gas stations. 92% of which are independently owned or operated. Independent distributors probably had their hand in the cookie jar too, buying up fuel on the wholesale spot market and then sitting on it to drive up the price.
The guy who lives down the street from you and owns the corner gas station or distributorship ripped you off, not some big bad oil company.