Gas prices spike after Hurricane Ike

NEW YORK, Sept. 13 (UPI) -- U.S. gas prices are in the rise following Hurricane Ike, which made landfall along the Texas Gulf Coast Saturday, AAA said.

A nationwide pas price survey by AAA showed gas prices had risen for a fourth straight day, pushing the average price of regular unleaded gasoline up 5.8 cents to $3.73 a gallon, from $3.675 a day earlier, CNN reported Saturday.

The nearly 6-cent increase marks the biggest one-day spike this year and the largest since shortly after Hurricane Katrina hit the Gulf Coast in 2005, AAA said.

Recent price spikes in the Southeast, primarily the Carolinas, Tennessee and Kentucky, states which lie at the end of several pipelines, pushed the national average higher.

Price increases in other regions were slight, AAA said.

"There have been anecdotal reports about service stations running low on fuel and that's to be expected," said AAA spokesman Dan Ronan. "The good thing is that it seems as though the state and delivery systems have gotten a lot better since Katrina."