There isn't the spare capacity to make up for the missing production in the Gulf of Mexico. OPEC used to have 4 to 5 million barrels of spare capacity. That's down to about 1.5 million barrels a day this year.

Hurricane Katrina damaged platforms and ports and curtailed production at refineries in the Gulf of Mexico, the source of almost a third of U.S. oil output, ... The severe damage to our nation’s energy infrastructure is undoubtedly raising energy costs; however, we need to ensure that Americans are protected from businesses that may chose to take advantage of this tragedy.

Supplies are ample and stockpiles are rising. We're still lacking spare production capacity but the market is fairly happy that there's a good buffer in place in the form of inventories.

Once the storm gets in the Gulf of Mexico, there's no telling where it's going to go,

There may be more cycles of hyperventilation yet to come as Hurricane Rita blows through the Gulf of Mexico, but the DOE data for last week was a calming influence.

This is really much more important than OPEC supply as their spare capacity is largely heavy and sour and the real shortage is capacity to upgrade such fuels anyway,