Shreveport couple faces repair bill after filling up with bad gas at local station
By JOHN OAKES
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SHREVEPORT, Louisiana (KTBS) — The pumps at a Shreveport gas station remain shut down Wednesday after water and dirt were found in its tanks, according to the state. The Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry is now investigating.
When Lauren Wagnon filled up her car at the Circle K on Youree Drive and Southfield Road, she didn’t suspect something was wrong with the gas. After driving home, she realized there was a problem.
“We kept trying it and trying it, thinking, who knows what it is maybe it’s the battery. It was kind of this weird puttering sound, it sounded yea, like it was running out of gas, like the tank was empty.”
Wagnon and her husband Luke, had the car towed to a mechanic. Luke Wagnon says the mechanic “called me and said “it’s 90% water and dirt in your tank. Whenever they were pouring it out, there just no gas, nothing that looked like gas at all.”
Mike Strain, Commissioner of the Louisiana Department of Agriculture and Forestry says this issue isn’t entirely unheard of.
“If you have to look at the preponderance of the number of cases that we’ve looked at, it’s that the fill cap may not be on tight enough or they could be a cap in the gasket of the fill cap. And so, what happens is, if there is a heavy rain and the parking lot becomes flooded, and these tanks are below the ground, sometimes water can get in that way,” Strain said.
Strain’s department is still investigating the cause of the incident and is evaluating the Circle K’s tanks before re-opening the pumps.
“We’ll probably have to reprocess, pump the water out of the tanks, pump the fuel out of the tanks, put new fuel in. Then we take another sample, that sample must be brought to Baton Rouge to be tested and cleared.”
Meanwhile the Wagnons are left with a thousand dollar plus bill from the mechanic, on top of record high gas prices.
“Yea, it’s like 70 bucks to fill up a tank that used to be not even 40. So, it’s frustrating. This is the first time that something has happened with the car where it’s not actually our fault. We just filled up with gas and that’s it,” Wagnon said.
Luke Wagnon says they’ve been in touch with Circle K’s insurance company about being reimbursed. He’s confident it’ll work out. But, if it doesn’t soon, he said he’d give KTBS another call.
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