Here you were just getting used to some relief on gas prices and anticipating more was in the offing, when Mother Nature goes and wreaks havoc with your hopes.
From Bloomberg:
Almost 20 percent of the nation’s oil refining capacity was shut after Hurricane Ike slammed into the Gulf Coast today, limiting fuel deliveries and prompting analysts to predict gasoline prices may again reach $4 a gallon…Wholesale gasoline in the Gulf Coast market this week climbed before Ike’s arrival by 58 percent to $4.65 a gallon, according to Bloomberg data. Regular, self-serve gasoline at the pump rose 5.8 cents to an average $3.733 a gallon, AAA said today on its Web site. The price reached a record $4.11 on July 15…
Gasoline shortages may occur across the southern U.S. up to Washington because of the closures caused by Hurricane Gustav, which made landfall Sept. 1 in Louisiana, and now Ike, Kevin Kolevar, assistant secretary for electricity delivery and energy reliability at the U.S. Department of Energy, said on a conference call yesterday….
The storm idled about 99.7 percent of oil production and 98.5 percent of natural-gas output in the Gulf of Mexico, the U.S. Minerals Management Service said today. Gulf fields produce 1.3 million barrels oil a day, about a quarter of U.S. output, and 7.4 billion cubic feet of gas, 14 percent of the total, government data show.
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I *yike* Ike.