The owner of a gas station in Yarmouth County is expressing frustration with the fact that his fuel tanks sat empty for more than 24 hours amid widespread power outages across Nova Scotia.
Guy Surette, the owner of an Ultramar station in Tusket, N.S., said he was told that a power outage on Christmas Day affected the Esso gas distribution depot near the old oil refinery in Dartmouth, leaving the facility unable to pump gas into trucks to deliver it to stations around the province.
"They had their power back at two o'clock [on Wednesday] at the Dartmouth gas depot. The truck was leaving and was supposed to be here between six and seven last night," said Surette. "First thing when we opened early this morning, we still had no fuel. And I've been on the phone calling and trying to find out, 'Where's my fuel? What's going on?"
More than 24 hours later, on Thursday afternoon, Surette's gas station finally had its tanks refilled.
"A lot of people are coming in to get fuel for their generator because there are still some people who don't have power," said Surette. "We're like a Tim Hortons with no coffee — we're a gas station with no gas."
The Ultramar station in Tusket, N.S., has been out of gas for more than 24 hours. (Submitted by Guy Surette)
Because customers getting gas often buy something from the convenience store as well, Surette said he lost money on two fronts.
"Usually customers will come in and they'll buy some chips or some pop or bread or something," he said. "We're getting slapped twice here."
Several stations affected
Other gas stations across the province ran into the same issue. The Petro-Canada in Pubnico was without gas for a day-and-a-half but is now back to business as usual.
The Petro-Canada in Barrington ran out of gas on Boxing Day but was refilled by Thursday morning. Another Petro-Canada station on Herring Cove Road in Halifax also had dry tanks Wednesday but has since received a delivery of gas.
All three stations get their fuel from the Dartmouth depot.
Surette said he wants to know why a power outage would make it impossible for the depot to pump gas.
"I see all the big grocery stores with these huge generators, so if the power goes off, they're still running," said Surette. "Why wouldn't the gas depot have that too?"
Gordon Wong, a Calgary-based spokesperson for Imperial Oil, said the power outage had a minimal impact on the company's ability to load trucks at the Dartmouth terminal, but could not say if there was a backup power generator at the site.
