WHITING, Ind. (AP) — BP is alerting northwestern Indiana fuel distributors that it’s recalling unleaded regular gasoline shipped from its Whiting fuel storage terminal Aug. 13-17.
The company said Monday it believes that fuel stored in a tank at the storage depot could cause hard starting, stalling and other drivability issues. BP asks any customer whose vehicle has experienced those problems since Aug. 13 to contact its customer hotline at 1-800-333-3991.
BP says the fuel may have been purchased by motorists at BP and other retail outlets in the region.
BP says it’s going through shipping records and contacting customers who may have loaded tanker trucks at the terminal during the affected period.
News 10 contacted GasBuddy.com Tuesday to see how this will impact drivers in mid-Michigan. Senior Petroleum Analyst Patrick DeHaan doesn’t think it will have much impact on drivers far away from the source of the contamination, but says that doesn’t mean there is zero risk. He says the gasoline was likely being stored for local delivery, which means it is unlikely that gasoline shipped via pipeline from the refinery is impacted, and only local deliveries, or trucks that go directly to the refinery, are those impacted.
That being said, if a gas station in Lansing sent a truck all the way to Whiting, Indiana, it could be contaminated fuel. That’s highly unlikely because there are closer terminals to send trucks to.
DeHaan says drivers in southwest Michigan, Chicago and NW Indiana could be more at risk of getting the bad gas.
