DeSantis: Florida sets up fuel sites in Plant City, Bradenton and St. Pete. More to come

PLANT CITY — Three fuel distribution sites have been set up by the state in the wake of Hurricane Milton in an effort to alleviate problems getting fuel, as many gas stations are still without power or simply out of fuel.

And Gov. Ron DeSantis promised that more will be opened as needed.

DeSantis spoke of the fuel program during a 30-minute news conference at Plant City Stadium, one of the three distribution sites currently open. One is also open in Bradenton and another in St. Petersburg.

“We’re in the process of doing more,” DeSantis said. “We’re going to do another one closer to the heart of Tampa in Hillsborough County. We’re going to do another one in a different part of Pinellas County and we’re going to do at least one in Sarasota County and perhaps some more depending on the demand that we have.”

DeSantis said the loss of power is one of the major issues.

“When you have power out at gas stations, you can’t pump fuel,” he said. “When you have ports that are interrupted, they don’t get the shipments in as much. So we have a lot of fuel that we brought into Florida to be able to help and get people through it as we get back, and the private sector resolves the issue. So we stockpiled a lot of fuel. We’ve activated a lot of our fuel contracts and we want to be able to give people an option.

“I see a lot of people waiting in line at the gas stations that do have power, and these are really long lines,” he said. “And when the port of Tampa is open, you’re going to see the fuel flowing. But in the meantime, we want to give people another option.”

Joe Graham and his wife, Lecinda, of Plant City were among the people taking advantage of the option. They waited in line all morning to get their 10 gallons as cars were lined up more than a mile from the stadium. At least one car ran out of gas inside the stadium before it could reach the pump.

Joe Graham runs a group home in Tampa, and getting fuel is just part of his efforts.

“We have no water, we have not lights,” he said. “It’s really hard trying to get staff to come in. A lot of them are flooded out. We‘re doing this on a daily basis, so always trying to find out what the next deal is going to be. Right now, we’re trying to get this little gas because there’s no gas in the gas station.”

Initially, 250,000 gallons of gasoline and 250,000 gallons of diesel was on site, but more fuel will arrive as needed, according to Bill Smith of World Kinect Services. The Miami-based corporation is contracted with the Florida Division of Emergency Management to provide fuel. He said the site is expected to be open for days between 10 a.m. and 7 p.m.

The fuel is free, but each person is limited to 10 gallons.

“These public fuel sites, although we have done fuel support in the past, we’ve never done it to this scale, and that is on top of the amount of fuel that we provided directly to service stations,” DeSantis said.

DeSantis said the state put 400,000 gallons of diesel into the supply chain and 500,000 gallons of gasoline. He said there were 31 sites for emergency fuel distribution for first responders, health care workers and other critical personal.

The state, DeSantis said, still has 1.8 million gallons of diesel and more a million gallons of gasoline that will be used at the fuel depots until the fuel situation is resolved.

“We have Florida ports that are actively receiving shipments like Port Tampa Bay,” DeSantis said. “Additional vessels are en route, they are filling up the trucks and we’re bringing them to where they need to be.”

One terminal filled 531 trucks Friday, and the Florida Highway Patrol is escorting the tankers from the ports to the respective service stations.

“If you see a gas station is out, most of that is, they don’t have power,” DeSantis said. “Now, they may also need to get their fuel shipment as well. But if they don’t have power to be able to run the pumps, then it’s an academic issue.”

DeSantis said generators can be deployed to gas stations if they’re going to be without power for an extended period.

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“A lot of these gas stations, quite frankly, are supposed to have generators,” he said. “Very few of them have used them that I’ve seen, especially in the areas that were the hardest hit.”

DeSantis said he is optimistic that the stations that do not have power will be “getting power in relatively short order in the coming days.” Until then, DeSantis said the state sites will help fill the void.

“You’re going to have more of these state-run sites that are going to be available,” he said. “We understand particularly to get people through the weekend. We want to be able to do, use the fuel reserves that we provided and get those into people’s tanks.”

Kevin Guthrie, the executive director for the Florida Division of Emergency Management, said more fuel has been coming into the state. As of noon Saturday, four different ports were offloading 37.3 million gallons of fuel that will be pumped into the distribution lines and immediately be available.

(This story was changed to include more photos.)