Petrol and diesel set to be the new bog roll. Road Warriors unite! 🚙

I see some EU drivers will be allowed to stay till end of February now.

Get Christmas and Valentine’s Done?

Does anyone else think it’s interesting that from near-total coverage, there’s been very little in the news today about it?

At the risk of sounding a bit, well, loony, I wonder if the gov’t have ‘had a word’ about inciting hysteria (or even issued a d-notice)?

Or is it because things seem to be pretty much back to normal?

Not in my experience

I seen this
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-northamptonshire-58767230
and then read this
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-eu-referendum-36618701
and it all made sense

That’s brilliant!

Or is it because things seem to be pretty much back to normal?

“Many problems, most are focused on the South East with little sense of any improvement at all”

FRIDAY EVENING
We have posted this evening's motorway fuel closures confirmed by highway authorities here: https://t.co/NA2uzYrLwm A thread will follow

Many problems, most are focused on the South East with little sense of any improvement at all. (1/6)

— Motorway Services Online (@mwayservices) October 1, 2021

Or is it because things seem to be pretty much back to normal?

10pm – huge queue blocking a dual carriageway, cars presumably trying to get to the local Asda, nearest Shell station was coned off. Not any form of “normal” that I’ve seen before.

“Many problems, most are focused on the South East

I’m NW and the two local stations to me have both been coned off for s couple of days now (one Esso and one independent.) Not sure how representative of the rest of the area this is, but it’s not normal that’s for sure.

No Fuel to be had in Brighton area – Unless you want to queue for hours

We went to get shopping at sainsburys tonight , and 60+ cars queued up in car park even though garage was closed, when we came out of sainsburys even more were waiting,  asked one of the guys in high vis,  what was going on and was told they were going to get fuel in another 30mins , staff had leaked info onto social media and the locusts had arrived…

earlier had been out on road bike and roads to asda fuel station totally blocked with q’s

wont be going anywhere in car any time soon

Just filled up from fumes at a garage with nobody else there apart from a board looking staff member,  go me.

Apologies, pretty much back to normal here in Ilkeston Thursday night/Friday.

Seems yet another reason to avoid the SE. 😉

it seems a bit mean spirited to fill right up when half a tank will easily see me though the next fortnight

Yesterday I pulled into a small service station parking to grab some lunch. While I was browsing online with a sarnie, windows down, early autumn sunshine warming my arm – I became aware of Audi S-line man parked next-door. His engine had been running these last ten minutes. He kept his engine running for another ten while filling his face with the biggest roll I’ve ever seen, and then off he drove. There was no (vehicle) fuel available at this service station. I then wondered if he was keeping his engine running all day in defiance of the supply shortage? Sort of flipping the bird to the whole thing? Or maybe he believes that his engine uses more fuel to stop and start again vs idling for 20 mins?

Apparently the military are going to help deliver fuel from next week so I imagine everyone will calm down this weekend. Obviously.

Actually, I think i snapped a photo of them practising deliveries in the Thanet area:

I then wondered if he was keeping his engine running all day in defiance of the supply shortage? Sort of flipping the bird to the whole thing? Or maybe he believes that his engine uses more fuel to stop and start again vs idling for 20 mins?

Or he wanted a lack of fuel to get out of work/job/errand/in laws.

I escaped an extra call on Friday due to fuel concerns.

I then wondered if he was keeping his engine running all day in defiance of the supply shortage? Sort of flipping the bird to the whole thing? Or maybe he believes that his engine uses more fuel to stop and start again vs idling for 20 mins?

Got to keep the phone charged and the air con running!
My car will allow you to half turn the key to fire up the electrics without running the engine but a modern car with a start/stop button won’t allow that, it’ll rely on engine auto-stop which (a) has to be enabled and (b) won’t work all the time, especially if the air con is on – even if you’re stationary the engine will fire up to power the air con.

There was a big police 4×4 parked outside the town hall the other day, engine running for 20+ minutes. Guessing they need the engine on to power their radios and onboard ANPR cameras…?

I thought everything could run on ‘sovrunty’?

Clacket Lane about 8 PM last night was looking normal with no queues. there is a premium to be paid for this however.

I seen this
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-northamptonshire-58767230

It’d be great to get an empty tanker and just drive around for hours – potentially on quite a long cross-country trip – and just see how many people follow you around and also how many eventually break down due to running out of fuel.

“No, sorry mate, this is empty, I’m heading back to the refinery. In Liverpool.”

Not normal near me. 2 closed for varous reasons, 2 open with queues getting on for 1/4 mile long. So thats maybe 50 plus waiting at 0800 on a Saturday morning.
Im ok with 500 range still so hopefully will be sorted by the time i need to fuel up. Roads are definitely quiter and so is work as we get daily footfall numbers.

Plus that guy wasn’t transporting 44t of morter. Maybe 30t of ready mix concrete. Just shows how silly its all getting. Local bookface page has banned tanker updates ad it exasperates the panic, not even allowed to ask which garages have what fuel available and how bad the queues are

Many local garages around Burnley with no diesel last night. I can access it from a pump at a local fuel depot with a fuel card but bad for a lot of people. The local depot had even been opening for the public to let some key workers get fuel.

Well, who’d have thunk it? Things are getting worse. Its almost as if we’ve a bunch of blithering incompetents in government who haven’t got the first clue how to solve a crisis they needlessly created

The chairman of the Petrol Retailers Association has warned that fuel shortages are getting worse in some parts of the country.

me for @theipaper

https://t.co/R18JEYkh0J

— Sam Tabahriti (@samtabahriti) October 2, 2021

Main road in and out of the village be like… “Queuing for petrol one way queuing for the GP surgery another….. so many cars”. Random FB comment 🙁

A friend is on her way up to mine at the moment from Kent, she’s driven past 7 closed garages and has just sent me a pic of the queue she’s in now for one that apparently does have fuel…

I think that we’ve hit the tipping point up here where everyones car must be full. Just nipped out for some odds and sods and past the garage. Petrol and diesel on and no queues. They’ve been shut up until yesterday since last weekend.

At that tipping we find out if there is a real supply chain issue, and we can stop blaming the public.

A reminder, “no problem here”, doesn’t mean every area is the same.

Did a 510 mile road trip. Filled up no problem.

independent in my local town had £30 limit, drove into Plymouth and no queues or restrictions anywhere.

Its almost as if we’ve a bunch of blithering incompetents in government who haven’t got the first clue how to solve a crisis they needlessly created

It’s almost as if there was actually a supply problem, in some areas at least, rather than just a panic problem.

Well, just goes to show how some people can still be nice during all this shite.
Cut a long story short, only way I could think to get some diesel in my absolutely empty tank was stick my canister in a rucksack and ride round til I could find a garage. First 2 were closed, got to Sainsbury’s, massive queue, woman in hiviz directing everything (Silvia). I ride up and say can I join the queue and fill my canister? Woman in the car at the front of the queue offers to fill it for me, but she’s getting petrol, so it will be awkward. Silvia then says tell the kiosk she said I could jump the queue. Kiosk lady takes me to a broken pump, with no queue, says it will fill a canister. I carefully ride home, empty the canister and am now just about the get hold of a pump nozzle..

Had to drive to Corby this morning. First station nothing, second one (Shell) no problems. Local one here, BP, nothing and 10p more per litre. Gouging.

Didn’t even think to check how much Sainsburys were charging!

There are good people. Nice story.

Gave me a warm feeling. Badly written cos done on phone while queuing 😀 (I know I know) So hard to type into the forum when ads cover the post entry box… Great design STW!
Queue for fuel looked ridiculous, but actually went through pretty quick. I wish I’d taken Silvia some biscuits or something, standing out in the rain all day.

Managed to pull straight up to a pump and fill up at my local place at 07:00 today, thanked the chaps serving. Passed another station after on the way to work also with fuel and no queues

Managed to fill up Thursday night, 250 round trip today dropping son at uni, so should have about half a tank left after that. Think MrsMC has a 100 mile work trip on Monday so we should be OK till after then.

Just driven 550 miles from Gairloch to Herefordshire in a car with an inconveniently small fuel tank which means it has an effective range of about 220 miles before getting anxious about it. Absolutely no problems in north west Scotland during the last week, we saw no queues at all even though where we were staying is about 500 m from the NC500 route. We filled up in Perth Tesco at 8 am this morning and fewer than half the pumps were occupied. No problem at Tebay South or Kidderminster services either (apart from the price of course) From the M5 to home, saw three garages closed, a queue at another and two others with only one pair of pumps operating. I am very pleased to be home (!)

Filled up in Cardiff. One place closed, one with only unleaded (and one customer) and about 2/3 of pumps with both fuels at Caridiff Gate services. And only a few customers there.

Get Christmas and Valentine’s Done?

Talking of Christmas…..

Definitely not normal around Aldershot way now – Tesco, Morrisons, Farnham Sainsburys, Hog’s Back Services, Gulf, BP, Ash – all out. Went to the new services at the bottom of the A331 at half 7 this morning and they were closed but there was a tanker filling them up. Parked up, popped into the Starbucks for a coffee and sat and waited for an hour before they opened up. Managed to get both cars fuelled though, so hopefully should see us through til next weekend. OH is wfh and I try and cycle in if I can, but with the weather this week and needing to get to the horses with dogs in tow we’ve needed fuel more than usual.