I'm driving home as well, I pass 7 or 8 gas stations, will report on the lines and prices when I get home.

From what I heard at lunch, the airport was not significantly damaged. However, there is no electricity to the airport, and all communications is being done by hand-held equipment. As was posted earlier they are using the airport for humanitarian aid, and also a staging ground for all of the emergency services.

http://www.atlantagasprices.com/

Scroll down and check out the highest prices in the last 24 hours

I heard 4.75 off of Haynes Bridge in Alpharetta, but that was only one station.

The gas station near the house was so full that I couldn't get close enough to see the price. It is mass hysteria at its finest.

The opportunistic oil company executives and gas station owners should be shot along with the looters.

FEMA: Some people will not be able to get back to their homes for months, if ever.

Well, there were some places that went from around $1.50 to over $5. But, in general, prices didn't spike that much. That said, the places in Kansas and Missouri who did that were prosecuted by the Attorney Generals for price gouging.

SI

Atlanta prices are anywhere between 3.30 and 5.50, depending on the capitalist nature of the owners. All the stations are jammed. However, there is no shortage, according to the government, because we, GA, get most of our gas from our ports. We do not have a problem with gas shortages, it's just mass hysteria.

They just showed a BP selling gas for 5.57 in Atlanta - across the street from another station (Amoco maybe) at 3.69.

Edit - Shown on Fox News, it was actually at 5.87.

Well in case anyone wanted to hear some personal good news, my parents house in the western suburbs apparently came out nice and dry on the inside. Also, people can even return tomorrow if they wanted to, they just wouldn't have all the utilities. The thing is, apparently its going to be the first area in New Orleans to get the electric companies in starting now until next week.

I was planning on moving back to N.O. today or tomorrow, as my lease up here ran out today and I had my last day at work yesturday. I couldn't go down there right away however, but my apartment complex heard my situation and offered me a week by week lease(normally just a year lease place). It sure beats my plan of camping out for a while. Always good to have people help you out even a little in situations like this.

But it looks like we, as part of our larger family, I will be heading to my parents house and we will be serving as home base and a place to stay for our relatives in the New Orleans area. And I wouldn't be surprised if St Charles Parish ends up serving as the same for lots of people all over the city.

It jumped up to about 3.00 a gallon on average around here. But Ive seen it as low as 2.87 this evening....

Gas prices appear relatively unchanged around San Jose - about 2.80/gallon

Since there is are refineries in Richmond, I don't expect the Bay Area to see a spike, unless the pipelines to the refineries are supplied from the Gulf Coast area.

In reading an article from the Times-Picayune....


Thirty days is a long time and the general in the army corps put that as the minimum. Seems like if everything goes well and this or that doesn't get messed up. Then there's the cleanup of everything else that is in the water now and cleaning up once of all this once the water leaves.

Prices ranged from 2.79 to 3.99 between my office and home. Lines were incredibly long. Gov. Purdue says that we will *not* run out, that it is an urban legend.

Good to hear Tigercat!


On my drive home, I did not see a single gas station over $3.00. $2.89 and $2.99 all over the place. The brand new Kroger gas station had a *line* of at least 30 cars. they were $2.89 and offer 3 cents off to anyone with a kroger card, 10 cents off if you've spent $100 at the store.

The biggest station I pass is a RaceTrac on Pleasant Hill, 24 pumps. All 24 were full, there were cars in line for most of them and about 12 cars in line out onto Pleasant Hill itself. I would guess there were 50-55 cars in total there. Gas was $2.99 there.

A small Texaco a bit further away from the mall/interstate has simply taken its prices down, so I don't know what they are there, though I suspect gouging. It's a small station with 10 pumps I believe, and there were about 15 cars in all at that station.

Insantiy.

That is very good news :)

See- that's the thing. It's not about refineries or anything at this point. It's about seeing how much cash you can squeeze out of a paranoid populace.

SI

Oh, and that range is particularly strange because...

1. I live less than 5 miles from my office.
2. The first gas station I pass is around 2 miles from my office.
3. The last gas station I pass is around 1 mile from my home.

So, the prices ranged from 2.79 to 3.99 in less than a 2-mile span.

I'm starting to look at "corporate furnished apartments" in the Baton Rouge area to see if any have vacancies for the next months as a possible plan. I left messages with a few of them and we'll see if any of them get back to me today or tomorrow.

Problem with that is ... we're ALREADY out in some places.

Now, is that because of a shortage or panic buying or whatever ... {shrug}.
The "why" isn't as important as the "what" out here in the boonies today.

We've got police trying to direct traffic around a couple of the stations now, the lines at running about 45 minutes as of 4pm or so, and there's already been several pushing/shoving/nose-to-nose confrontations. It doesn't take much for tempers to flare in long lines, add the heat, and add the pressure of "no gas, no job" & this may get ugly in at least isolated areas.

I think the guv's prepared text (I haven't heard him directly but I've seen the planned transcript) will prove accurate -- basically a 3-5 day wrinkle with scattered outtages/shortages. Problem is, that's all that matters if you're in one of those areas that are high & dry.

edit to add: Oh, btw, I appear to have hit the prize-gouging lottery when I bought my gas earlier. Station two blocks away is fifty cents cheaper, and that's about what all the others who still have gas are pricing as of 4pm.

The (very) good news: My parents are safely out of the city now. They had no trouble driving out of the city from Children's Hospital earlier today.

The bad news: Our house was a quarter block from the 17th St. canal, and I have seen pictures of the neighborhood several times on the WWL-TV feed. There is at least 10 ft of water in the street, and thus anywhere from 6-8 feet of water in the house.

Glad to hear it, all good news is welcome AFAIC.

Yay! and Suck :(

SI

Georgia governor Perdue says Price Gouging is going on. http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news.../31perdue.html

My father in law told us not to come up to greenville this weekend because he stopped at 3 different stations and they were all out of gas. He doesn't want us to get stuck up there. I got gas this morning. It was 2.63. Not too bad actually. Only $.20 higher than 3 weeks ago.

We are seeing crazy pricing here, too -- driving today I saw prices of 2.59 and 3.45 within ten miles of one another.

I think there is a major pipeline running to the East Coast from the Gulf that is down for now. Here in the West, we get our supplies somewhere else and there was only a slight bump: from $2.65 to $2.79, and no lines in any of the stations I passed on the way home.

Regarding the news that I've been following all day (mostly wwltv), you guys are on top of things and good discussions. What is starting to piss me off a little is the hyperbole we've been hearing: "total" destruction, "completely" rebuild, and so on. I understand the nature of flooding in what it does to interior walls as well as the foundation, but in New Orleans, most of the buildings still stand - including everything except one brick building in the FQ. Foundations can and will be shored up, as well as decontaminated so it's not like a H-bomb went off and leveled a city.

The most important thing is the infrastructure and that will take time.

However, I do like Jim's analogy in comparing the aftermath to the race riots of the late 60s (esp. Detroit) and what they left the city as. I think we will see this to some extent in NO. We are already seeing some near-future relocations spread across Texas, et al (bless them) and it might turn to something more permanent, esp. after the insurance claims.

I must say that I'm pleasantly surprised that no news agencies that I know of have shown video of bodies in the water--although it sounds like there are a lot of them.

But we really don't how many of them were corpses from the above-ground cemeteries. Nor do we know if they were clustered along a certain street or area.

Yeah, I heard Shep Smith talk about how they have rolls of tape they will not show on the air, because they are too horrific.

Heh.

Just got a call from my wife's best friend. She works for an airline & was airborne when my wife left her a little warning voicemail about the lack of gas she might run into on the way home & suggested she get it as she left the airport (she's one of those "oh shit, the gas light is on" types, might run out of gas on a normal day muchless today) .

1st place she tried to stop was on Mt.Zion Blvd -- $4.99 for regular ... and a parking lot full of cops. Two of the police were working with a customer to make sure everything was documented in order to charge & eventually nail the gouging station owner. The other cops were re-directing motorists who tried to pull into Mr. $4.99 to the Racetrack just over the hill, where the price was $2.99.

Ya gotta love it when you catch cops doing the whole "serve & protect" thing :D

It's not just structural integrity that's an issue in the aftermath of these buildings being soaked for weeks on end (though that's a major one in and of itself) - it's related issues like mold that prove extremely pervasive, and more importantly it's the spread of toxic chemicals all around the city which may well leave much of the soil at levels far higher than is normally allowed by the EPA. What to do then? Undertake a massive Superfund cleanup and the related expense and time to do so, or waive the rules and let the 'buyer beware' so to speak regarding health risks of living, working and visiting the area?

Which is a shame.

Which goes back to my earlier comment about "parts in billions". In my city and others as well, they condemn, confiscate and abandone property that had less contamination than what most structures in NO will face. If they apply the same rules, then much of NO will never, ever be inhabitable again. But I am guess that for the sake of economics, cultural considerations and logistics, they are going to have to compromise the rules - as you said.

My guess is that the region will focus on its resources and to maintain a working population to run those resources (oil, gas, refineries, sugar? etc.). The rest will 1) become an enclave centered around the FQ and 2) become a shell - East Bank particularly. I don't see core NO become a consumer-centric city in the near future, unless Congress authorize hundreds of billions.

Here's the thing though - those rules weren't put in place by drawing a number out of a hat - you might have quibbles about the exact level that should be considered safe, but I can't imagine it will be possible to allow a level on orders of magnitude higher in terms of pollution, both in the water and the soil as well as existing structures. This is going to be a very expensive and probably long-term reconstruction.


This will be fascinating to watch - I can't think of any American city of this size that's basically faced a near-total reconstruction. Urban planners are going to go crazy figuring out how New Orleans will be rebuilt. I think you're right - I think essentials will be the first thing rebuilt and then the historic (and least damaged) areas, with the rest possibly left alone or the focus of a massive, very long cleanup process.

And if that starts to happen, I imagine you'll see some very serious grassroots opposition, especially if the geography of the area is made clear to the average Joe/Jane.

Did anyone see Anderson Cooper 360? It seems that they are finding bodies of whole families just about in every house in I think it was Biloxi.

As for the floating bodies: I think that those are pretty much ''FRESH'' ones. Correct me if Im wrong but I think the bodies tend to stay in the coffin in most cases and just float or sink in them, I could be wrong though.

Shepard Smith's coverage and commentaries are top notched. With alot of emotion and
sounds real genuine.
Also: Steve McNair's mom is reported ''missing.'' according to a local sports talk radioshow. Mc Nair was talking with his mom and she said something along the lines of ''The tiles in the roof are being tossed around ...'' and the line went dead.

No doubt. I don't think there's any doubt, based on the existing industry in the area as well as the history that some parts of New Orleans will be rebuilt. But the extent of that rebuild (and the amount the federal government pays for) I think is going to be subject to serious questioning due to the likely cost of doing so.

That said, I've already seen some economists talking about how this should work out to be a boost to the economy, so I suspect much of the argument for rebuilding New Orleans will be along those lines.

Well I'm glad to hear your parents are safe :)

Very nice :D. I hope the guy gets a very hefty fine!

Interesting. The Mayor just ordered 1,500 police to leave their search and rescue mission and take care of the looters.

I think there are going to be books written - in hindsight of course - of all of the crises and decisions being made this week.

Not to mention the interest in sociology and the chaos theory thats gonna abound the next few months.

There will be at least three kinds of books - the ones focusing strictly on this event and the aftermath, the academic ones looking at this as a case study in a lot of areas such as sociology, and those that look at how New Orleans got to this point. There's been a lot of talk already about the role the declining wetlands in the delta have played in exacerbating this tragedy.

Checking the website, it says that LSU School of Medicine will resume classes and operations within the next 3 weeks in Baton Rouge. Decisions made from the meeting of Department heads tomorrow will be posted in the next 24-48 hours on the emergency website. Tomorrow, I'll intensify my search for a furnished apartment(s) for our crew (5 people and 4 pets counting Mrs. Eaglesfan and myself) in the Baton Rouge area via the internet and phone.

It doesn't look like we'll try to drive up to NJ.

After all the lawsuits are settled.

O'Reilly Factor just did something that really made me uncomfortable ... Bill was talking with three different people who had been rescued, or as it turned out, two rescued ppl & a 77 y/o woman that is still trapped in her home along with her 98 y/o mother.

O'Reilly had her give out her specific street address on national TV, basically promising to get her out of there one way or another. While I realize the number of predators with access to the Factor is probably pretty limited, I just really got a bad feeling giving out that address did as much to put a bullseye on her forehead as it did to get her rescued.

I'll give him credit for very good intentions (and a healthy dose of ego), but a D- for his judgement on not having her give the info to producers off-air instead of on-air.

Except in many places, the house addresses are underwater (or damaged) and going have to go on landmarks instead.

Nagin has finally declared martial law. Perhaps, this is old news. However, it is listed as breaking news on wwltv and is the first I've heard of it. It also mentioned that Nagin is furious with the looters and is changing the 1500 police officer's focus to stopping those looters via any means necessary.

I hope other agencies are going to be rescuing people, but I'm glad to see something being done to stop those who are looting non-necessity items.