Colonial Pipeline said it resumed operations late Wednesday following a five-day blackout triggered by a ransomware attack that caused fuel shortages and panic buying on the East Coast.
"Following this restart, it will take several days for the product delivery supply chain to return to normal," the operator of the 5,500-mile pipeline said on its website. "Some markets served by Colonial Pipeline may experience, or continue to experience, intermittent service interruptions during the startup period.
In the meantime, however, drivers across the region are "hoarding" gas, according to U.S. energy secretary Jennifer Granholm in a news conference May 11.
The shutdown of the fuel artery caused panic among businesses and consumers. American Airlines added temporary refueling stops to two long-haul flights departing from Charlotte, North Carolina, and Southwest Airlines flew planes with extra fuel into airports such as Nashville International Airport.
Meanwhile, filling stations in some states were selling up to three times their usual amount of fuel, resulting in price increases of 8 to 10 cents per gallon. Some gas stations are out of fuel, while others limit transactions to 10 gallons or less.
According to GasBuddy, an analytics company that tracks gas prices and availability, gas demand in PADD 1, the oil distribution area that covers the entire east coast, is 35% higher this week than the previous week.
Panic-buying poses a greater threat to gas availability than the pipeline closure itself, said Fernando Valle, a senior energy analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence.
Gas demand is just starting to rebound from the pandemic, and distributors have already started stockpiling gas in preparation for the high-demand summer season, so the existing inventory of gas is still very high.
In other words, the issue for the next few days would be distribution, not a real underlying shortage.
"There isn't a supply problem," Valle said. "Actually, because of the pandemic, there's a lot of supply. And because the outage is less than a week, this is nothing that should be dangerous to consumers at the end of the day."
Colonial Pipeline suspended operations briefly Saturday after determining that it had been the target of a ransomware attack. The pipeline runs through 11 states, from New Jersey to Texas.
