More than half a dozen liquefied natural gas (LNG) tankers were waiting offshore in the Gulf of Mexico as Hurricane Delta left the Mexican shores and moved up towards the US Gulf coast.
Most tankers were located outside of Cheniere Energy Inc’s Sabine Pass and Cameron LNG’s Cameron plants in Louisiana, reported Reuters, citing data from Refinitiv. There were also a few outside of Freeport LNG’s Freeport plant in Texas.
Delta is scheduled to hit central Louisiana on Friday October 9th, although it now seems more likely to be a Category 2 rather than the previously feared Category 4.
There are two tankers currently loading at Sabine – Pearl LNG and Torben Spirit, but both were expected to leave port before the storm arrived on the US Gulf Coast.
Both Sabine and Cameron were impacted by Hurricane Laura in late August. Sabine shut by August 25th and started returning around September 3rd. Cameron shut around August 26th but did not start to return until September 27th It only received its first vessel on October 4th after the US Army Corps of Engineers cleared the ship channel connecting the plant to the Gulf of Mexico.