We are in the middle of a gasoline shortage, caused by a POL pipeline leak. It had to shut down for repairs, which causes a hiccup in the supply but should not cause a total lack of delivery. Turns out the news media started running stories about how prices were going up, which caused everyone to rush out and fill up, which then led to stations running out and so on.

Now there are very few places in the state that still have fuel, and it’s a crisis.  As I posted long ago, I store 10 gallons of gasoline in sealed  jerry cans so we are OK for a few weeks, plus I have 50 gallons in my pickup that I can drain out if needed.  This was another wake up call, I didn’t anticipate the need for that much fuel to be stored. I figured if something happened I’d just need enough for a few car trips and then the generator for battery bank charging.  Based on this event, I think I need at least 25 gallons stored plus truck tanks for 55-60 total.

It’s not the supply itself, rather the panic buying that causes the issue. I can see how any little disruption in fuel/food/supplies will get amplified by the media, so it’s best to have plenty on hand of whatever you may need. It will be interesting to see how long this lasts, in a actual crisis things would take forever to recover due to the lack of backups and people’s behavior. I can totally see rioting happening, it probably wouldn’t take much esp. if food was involved. Case in point: 22 LR ammo. Back in 2012 there was some talk of tightening up gun laws, which somehow led to  a run on 22 ammo. It took over a year for the supply to get to above zero, but in 2016 we are still on allocation with high prices in place. Unbelievably, people are STILL trying to amass 10-20K rounds which is just killing the supply chain.