Gas Outages Popping Up In Metro Atlanta After Irma

ATLANTA, GA — Gas stations in metro Atlanta and elsewhere throughout Georgia were reporting gas outages Tuesday as supply lines snarled by Hurricane Irma mixed with heavy demand from storm-weary evacuees starting to head back south after the storm.

But experts say that within a day or so they expect supplies at the pump to be back to normal in the Peach State.

Georgia Emergency Management & Homeland Security on Tuesday said that reports of fuel outages from throughout the state were rolling in. The outages were due to a variety of factors, including power outages at gas stations, flooding fuel tanks and difficulty getting stations resupplied with gas.

In one of the most extreme cases, Camden County — on Georgia's southern border along Interstate 95 — released a statement Tuesday asking motorists, including evacuees returning to Florida, not to stop there.

The statement said that "no driver services," including gasoline, are available in the county because of Hurricane Irma.

"Officials urge all drivers to plan their trips with the knowledge that Camden County will not be able to fulfill their needs," read the statement. (Get Patch's Daily Newsletter and Real Time News Alerts. Or, if you have an iPhone, download the free Patch app.)

Tuesday afternoon, website GasBuddy showed more than a dozen Atlanta stations with no gas, nearly 20 that still didn't have power after the storm and another 15 or so where the gas products that were available were limited.

According to the site, the following percentages of gas stations in Georgia were out of gas Tuesday afternoon:

• Macon: 14%
• Augusta: 20%
• Savannah: 30%
• Columbus: 17%
• Thomasville: 31%
• Albany: 20%
• Atlanta: 14%

Georgians can visit GasBuddy's tracker site and type in their location to get real-time information on which stations in their area have gas and which don't.

Angela Holland, president of the Georgia Association of Convenience Stores, said outages currently are hitting gas stations along the state's interstate highways the hardest as travelers begin heading home after evacuating.

"We know that stations have had spotty outages here and there, but they've been refueling as fast as they possibly can," Holland said.

Watch: Hurricane Irma's Destructive Journey By The Numbers

Read: 3 Dead, Million+ Without Power After Hurricane Irma Soaks Georgia

She said heavy demand — from worried Georgians, visiting evacuees and people filling up power generators — hit just as travel for the trucks that keep gas stations fueled up became difficult.

"The system isn't equipped for everybody to come get gas at the same time, but you didn't really have a choice," Holland said. "Combine that with 3-5 million people coming from Florida and it puts a strain on the system."

She said that as Georgia's roadways continue to clear, supplies at the pump should be normal again within the next day or so. Gasoline production and distribution, which had been hampered when Hurricane Harvey struck Houston and the Gulf Coast, is now back to mostly normal, she said.

Megan Osborne, a spokeswoman with the AAA auto club, concurred, saying, "we don't expect them to be out for weeks at a time."

"What we are facing is not a gasoline shortage, but instead localized challenges and outages stemming from already tightened supply in the aftermath of Hurricane Harvey and a heightened demand from those evacuating ahead of Hurricane Irma," she said.

Photo via GasBuddy.com