In Douglas County, Ga., the police issued a request for motorists to stop calling 911 for help finding open gas stations. A county spokeswoman said the calls could interfere with the ability to handle emergencies.

In Atlanta, where sprawl forces lengthy commutes, drivers shook their heads in disbelief over around-the-block lines at stations, $4-per-gallon prices and the prospect of two more weeks of problems.

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“At first I was a good sport, but this is getting ridiculous,” said Marsha Lewis, 43, an administrative assistant who lives in Dacula, Ga., and commutes to Atlanta. “I drive an hour to work every day, and looking for gasoline has become my entire life.”

John Temples, 49, a self-employed construction worker, waited 30 minutes to refill his brown GMC van at a Shell station in Decatur, Ga. “This is a friendly town, and right now it’s basically just an annoyance,” he said. “But if there were an emergency and people needed to get out of town, things could get violent.”

Waiting behind five cars at a BP station in Atlanta, Mike Adams, 28, a paralegal, called the shortage “an absolute catastrophe.”

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“Every few days they say it’s going to get better,” Mr. Adams said, “but it only seems to get worse.”

Both supply and demand are perpetuating the shortage. Refinery damage and power failures in Texas created the conditions, said Brandon Wright, a spokesman for the Petroleum Marketers Association of America, but drivers contributed by refueling more often than necessary.

“You hear stories about tankers pulling into gas stations and people are already waiting — and they have half a tank,” Dr. Medlock said. “It’s akin to hoarding.”

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Electrical power is now coming back to refineries in Louisiana and Texas. ConocoPhillips said Monday that its large Alliance and Lake Charles refineries in Louisiana were back on line.

A few refineries, including an ExxonMobil facility in Beaumont, Tex., suffered flooding from Hurricane Ike and will not be fully repaired for at least several weeks. Oil analysts said they expected the gasoline shortages in much of the Southeast to improve gradually through Columbus Day.

In the meantime, Mr. Wright said, “Folks need to take a deep breath.”