2 1/2 weeks after Hurricane Ike:
We're still experiencing gas shortages in Atlanta. On Sunday, David was driving on fumes. Every gas station he drove by had bags over their pump handles, or yellow tape around the islands. Once home, he spent hours on the phone, calling every gas station listed on Google Maps, within a 15 or 20 mile radius of our house. Not a single one had gas. But two stations said they expected a delivery overnight.
At 6 am on Monday Greta and David headed out, expecting long lines. They happened to time it well; a tanker was just leaving the first station that thought it would be getting gas. David had no wait and got his gas. On the way home he saw that one of the stations near our house had cars at most of the pumps. With that news, Chuck and I jumped in our cars and snagged the last two pumps. But no one was pumping. Wondering what the deal was, I asked the cashier. They had gas, but he had to reset the pumps, a one hour job. We waited. We got our gas (limit of $40). We went home.
Although I have gas now, I continue to walk. Yesterday I even did the three miles to the grocery store, and three miles home. Not too bad. My car is acting as our reserve gas tank, to be used if David can't find gas again, and they need to get to school.
I did a little woman-on-the-street survey of gas stations this week. The news media is reporting that the whole problem is caused by consumers "panic buying", but the info I got from gas stations says otherwise.
Station #1: No deliveries for the past 13 days. Usual deliveries are twice a day.
Station #2: His first delivery in 7 days. Usual deliveries are once every two days. Sold out in four hours.
Station #3: Last delivery 5 days ago. Usual deliveries once a day.
Station #4: Selling the last of his delivery this morning; previous delivery 5 or 6 days ago. Usually gets a delivery every day.
The typical price is $4.29 for regular, but one or two stations are selling at $3.99. Only diesel and regular are being delivered. We understand that most of the rest of the country has it for $3.19 to $3.39?
We heard yesterday that the refineries are finally fully operational and gas is flowing through the pipeline at the normal rate. But "normal" is 5 mph, so it will still take two weeks to arrive. Again, they tell us all stations will be back to normal in two weeks.
