Flooding, power outages and storm damage left the US oil industry in disarray Thursday, prompting warnings from officials that it could take months to restore a refining system devastated by Hurricane Katrina.
Even as some oil pipelines and storage systems started to resume operations, gasoline prices continued to rise and the government estimated it could take key refineries "several months" to resume full production of petroleum products.
"Unlike 2004's Hurricane Ivan, which affected oil production facilities and had a lasting impact on crude oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, it appears that Hurricane Katrina may have a more lasting impact on refinery production and the distribution system," the US Energy Information Administration said.
Along the Gulf Coast, the heart of the country's refining industry, eight refineries representing more than 10 percent of the nation's overall capacity remained shut after deadly Hurricane Katrina slammed into Louisiana and Mississippi on Monday, officials said.
Further north, plants in Ohio, Illinois and Tennessee also curtailed production because of pipeline disruptions.
With concerns about gasoline supplies mounting - and no clear picture of when production would return to normal - already red-hot prices continued to soar on Thursday. Futures on the New York Mercantile Exchange shot up 17.47 cents to $2.43 per gallon.
Among the companies with Gulf Coast operations, Murphy Oil Corp said it could not provide a timetable for the restart of its 125,000 barrel-per-day refinery in Meraux, Louisiana.
The company said flooding occurred at plant, but that damage to the facility was less serious than some had feared.
"While repair to part of the plant's electrical equipment and instrumentation, as well as a general cleanup of the facility, will be necessary, the refinery appears to have sustained no major damage from the storm," it said.
Valero Energy Corp said Thursday it requested a loan of 1.5 million barrels of crude oil from the US Strategic Petroleum Reserve for three refineries. It said the oil should allow it to bring its Krotz Springs, Louisiana, plant to full production by Sunday.
Chevron Corp declined to comment on the state of its 325,000 bpd refinery in Pascagoula, Mississippi, which has been closed since before Katrina made landfall.
Another refinery, Marathon's Garyville, Louisiana, plant, sustained "minor damage," the Department of Energy said.
The industry's problems extend well beyond flooded refineries, however. Most Gulf of Mexico oil and natural gas production - accounting for about one-quarter of all US output - also remains out of service.
Independent oil and gas producer Apache Corp said it lost eight production platforms with output of 7,158 barrels of oil and 12.1 million cubic feet of natural gas a day.
Companies are also struggling to get in touch with staff, particularly those in New Orleans which has deteriorated into chaos due to flooding, looting, and power and communication failures.
Apache, Chevron and Anadarko Petroleum Corp said even if they could get their platforms and rigs running, the amount they can produce depends on the conditions of the pipelines, storage facilities and transportation.
"We are getting production up as much as we can, but this also depends on how soon pipelines can become available," said Apache spokesman Bill Mintz.
In that regard, an industry already strained by rising US and Asian demand has reported some measure of progress.
The Capline pipeline, the main crude pipeline between the Gulf Coast and the Midwest, has returned to service but will continue to run at reduced rates.
The executive director of the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port said he hopes to begin unloading oil on Friday.
"I was out there yesterday and it was not hit that hard," said Tommy Martinez. "Everything was structurally sound."
LOOP unloads around 900,000 bpd of imported crude oil from tankers and about 500,000 bpd of domestically produced oil.
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