RELATED: This Beloved Summer Food Is Disappearing From Stores and Restaurants. If you’re expecting to easily find gas this weekend, you might have to reevaluate your plans: The pipeline resuming operations isn’t going to immediately bring gas back. In fact, Patrick De Haan, head of petroleum analysis at GasBuddy, told USA Today that he expects the gas shortage will loom until the end of the month. “I think that by Memorial Day or shortly after, that it won’t be such a project to fill your tank back up,” he predicted.ae0fcc31ae342fd3a1346ebb1f342fcb De Haan also noted that people will likely see gas outage numbers peak 48 hours from now as the pipeline resumes over the next couple of days. By Memorial Day, “you may occasionally find a station without fuel, but outages should be less than 20 percent by then in all areas,” he tweeted on May 13. RELATED: If You Live in These States, Fill Up Your Gas Tank Right Now. According to De Haan, much of the ongoing shortage will be caused by humans continuing to hoard whatever fuel they can find—especially if they are not aware the pipeline has resumed operations. “A lot of people aren’t going to hear about this very quickly,” De Haan said. “People have jobs, they’re out and about—behavior won’t necessarily immediately change.” This will not only lead to shortages continuing later this week, De Haan said, but the situation may also get worse when the weekend demand hits. “People are filling up at a breakneck pace. There’s just no way that stations can stay anywhere near caught up,” he explained. Of course, panic buying isn’t the only reason the gas shortage could last until the end of the month. Colonial Pipeline Co. said in a statement that “it will take several days for the product delivery supply chain to return to normal,” even after they announced they were resuming operations. Susan Grisson, chief industry analyst at American Fuel and Petrochemical Manufacturers, told USA Today that this kind of disruption in the supply chain requires a strategy on how to continue operations. “It takes time to regroup massive quantities of product and efficiently make deliveries to more remote areas that are supplied by the Colonial; figuring out the time and logistics takes some time,” she said. RELATED: For more up-to-date information, sign up for our daily newsletter. Some states on the East Coast have been hit harder by this shortage than others. According to data from GasBuddy on May 13, North Carolina has been leading the pack with the most stations out of fuel at 71 percent. Following close behind is Virginia, South Carolina, and Georgia, where 55 percent, 54 percent, and 49 percent of stations are out of fuel, respectively. Fortunately, De Haan said on Twitter that he is “optimistic the situation will resolve quickly,” but he did add that “motorists could help the situation by holding off for a day or two to let stations refuel faster.” RELATED: The One Thing Every Major Department Store Is Starting to Ban.
