Steel market Update reported that Hurricane Sandy tore through the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern States in USA on Monday evening leaving a wide path of destruction in its wake.
The storm exceeded expectations as the storm surge broke records along the eastern seaboard. The Battery Park area in New York City was under water last night as the surge reached almost 14 feet breaking the old record by almost 3 feet. News reports from last night indicated waves in the NYC harbor grew to as much as 32 feet - six feet higher than the previous record for the area.
Steel Market Update attempted to contact companies up and down the east coast to see if we could get insights into the damage and its impact on the steel industry.
US Steel shut down their Fairless Works plant in eastern Pennsylvania on Monday but expects to re-open the facility sometime during the day on Tuesday.
We heard from a number of plants - both service center and manufacturing - as having power outage issues. Some are working on generators while others are suffering through. A number of companies felt it would be days - and perhaps weeks - before their power is restored.
We spoke with a wholesaler in New Jersey who told us most of the state was without power and even though some of their facilities had generators they were having difficulties communicating with their branches.
Another wholesaler located in northern Virginia reported their facility had been flooded but they were back to work today. Other companies in the area were also flooded.
We communicated with a scrap company in Pennsylvania who advised us their plants were closed today but would reopen later this week. “Things along the coast will be slow for a while until power is restored. There could be some bottleneck of flows but it will be temporary. Snow in the higher elevations of West VA and PA should have minimal impact. All of our facilities are closed today but will reopen as planned on Wednesday morning.” The expectation of this scrap company was for higher ferrous scrap prices in November. Their guess was up $20 to $40 per gross ton compared to where it was at the beginning of October.
Most companies we attempted to contact were closed or were not able to return either our emails or phone calls. The impact of Hurricane Sandy on the steel industry may take a few days to sort out.
Source - steelmarketupdate.com
(www.steelguru.com)
