As of Wednesday morning, McCauley said, tank farms in Baltimore, Springfield and Fairfax had enough fuel supplied by Colonial, but there weren’t enough drivers to get it from the storage facilities to gas stations. Many truck drivers who were laid off when people drove less earlier in the pandemic have found other jobs, he said, and it takes time for new workers to obtain the special licenses needed to transport hazardous materials.
“They’re seeing a crush of customers,” said McCauley, director of government affairs for the Washington, Maryland, Delaware Service Station and Automotive Repair Association. “People are filling up when they normally wouldn’t. The buying pattern has completely changed.”
He said one gas station owner reported seeing the same customer twice in one day.
“There’s uncertainty about when the pipeline is going to come back up,” McCauley said. “People want to keep their tanks full.”
Most fuel tanks at gas stations have monitors that automatically signal suppliers when they need refilling, McCauley said. But now, trucks aren’t available to bring more, and those that do have drivers are waiting longer at tank farms to fill up, he said.
Some station owners are getting increasingly nervous, he said, as they hear the lack of fresh supplies. No gas also means no customers buying sodas and snacks.
On Wednesday morning, Sajawal Butt, assistant manager of a Sunoco gas station at National Harbor in Prince George’s County, had no gas to sell. He said a truck was due later in the day.
“It goes very fast now,” he said. “I don’t know what’s going on.”
John Townsend, spokesman for AAA-Mid Atlantic, said the average price of a gallon of gas hit $3 per gallon Wednesday morning, up 7 cents from last Wednesday. Prices were up 11 cents a gallon statewide in Maryland, 13 cents in Virginia and 3 cents in the District — the result of heightened demand, he said.
Some gas station owners are probably hiking prices, Townsend said, because they don’t know when they will receive their next shipment or whether it will cost more as demand soars.
He said AAA is asking motorists to avoid filling up their tanks out of fear in the same way residents were asked not to hoard toilet paper and hand sanitizer at the start of the pandemic.
“We’re telling people to not panic and avoid topping off their tanks so they don’t make a bad situation worse,” Townsend said. “But the more you tell people to avoid panic-buying, the more it stirs up fear. I think that’s what we’re dealing with.”
Townsend said he’s telling friends worried about whether they will be able to fill up on road trips this weekend to keep their plans. He said they can use smartphone apps to find gas stations on their route with supplies, since the outages don’t appear to be widespread.
“There shouldn’t be a problem,” Townsend said. “If one station is out of gas, use another.”
Melissa Marrs, who lives about 20 minutes outside Charlottesville in Fluvanna County, Va., set up two of her sons for virtual classes Wednesday. One car was sitting in the driveway with half a tank after Marrs couldn’t find enough to fill it.
Her family is going to need some gasoline soon, she said. Her husband is a nurse — an essential worker who drives to a health-care facility treating coronavirus patients. She also worried about poor families in rural areas who might not be able to fill up until they get paid. Meanwhile, she said she’s seen people topping off gas cans, taking more than they need.
“They’re not thinking about their neighbors, but they should be,” she said. “I think we’re going to be in a tough spot … It’s just like it was with toilet paper.”
At nearby Fluvanna Market, the tanks were bone dry. An employee of a Charlottesville BP answered the phone Wednesday morning with the greeting: “Hello — no we don’t have gas.”
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Motorists line up at stations in D.C. region; shortage of gas truck drivers compounds situation - The Washington Post
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