Gas Shortage: Harvey Shuts Down Nation’s Largest Refinery; Stations Out Of Fuel; ‘Nobody Knows The Extent Of The Damage’

Hurricane Harvey devastated the Gulf region and soon could have a major impact at the gas pump.

Gas stations throughout Texas are running out of gas. Meanwhile, America’s largest oil refinery, located in Port Arthur, Texas, will be closed for at least two weeks.

The refinery is flooded and its owner, Motiva Enterprises, said it “cannot provide a timeline for restart at this time,” CNBC reported. Assessment of damage at the Port Arthur refinery cannot begin until floodwaters recede. That facility processes around 603,000 barrels of oil a day.

All total, 15 refineries that supply upwards of 18 percent of America’s gasoline and diesel fuel were shut down by Hurricane Harvey, Forbes reported.

Are Your Prepared For A Downed Grid? Get Backup Electricity Today!

“Nobody knows the extent of the damage to the pipelines and refineries,” QuikTrip spokesman Mike Thornbrugh told The Star-Telegram. “They’re under water.”

QuikTrip, which operates 135 convenience stores in North Texas, plans to stop selling gas at half of its locations this weekend, The Star-Telegram reported. Two-thirds of the pumps at a QuikTrip in Denton, Texas, were closed on Tuesday.

“QuikTrip is going to designate certain stores in all quadrants of the Metroplex and make sure those particular stores will have gasoline,” company spokesman Mike Thornbrugh told The Star-Telegram. “We have been through this in the southeast Atlantic area. If we tried to keep every store full of gasoline, we’d have outages everywhere.”

Said John Benda, the owner of four stations in the Dallas area, “I have never seen it this tight, since 1980, even when we were rationing,”

Bend offered some advice: “I called my family members and told them to fill up their tanks.”

It’s not just QuikTrip.

“We are currently out of unleaded and midgrade fuel and awaiting a fuel delivery,” a sign at a Kroger Fuel Center in Fort Worth said Wednesday.

What is your reaction? Do you think most Americans are prepared for a gas shortage? Share your thoughts in the section below: