ABINGDON -- Locking gas caps are becoming increasingly popular in the Abingdon area.

"When it [gas] first took its big jump up to $3 a gallon, we sold a bunch," said Kim Culbertson, sales associate for Abingdon Motor Parts.

Culbertson said sales have evened out.

"I've had one guy that come in with a hole in his gas tank; somebody knocked a hole in his gas tank," Culbertson said. "I've had other people come in saying they've had gas stolen out of their tank, coming in and getting locking gas caps."

The caps cost between $15 and $25.

"Gasoline is getting so expensive that people will go for it any way they can get to it," said Al Blevins, Abingdon Motor Parts owner. "The reason we don't have locking caps on ours . . . I'd hate to have to replace a $150 gas tank" damaged by a thief.

Blevins has been in business since 1955, and he says the gas situation is the worst he's seen since the oil crisis in the mid-1970s, when people waited in line to buy rationed fuel during an embargo by oil-producing nations.

"Most of the time, they come in and buy them just as a precaution," said Dave Helton at NAPA Auto Parts in Abingdon.

At Stant Manufacturing, an Indiana-based company that makes many of the locking gas caps, sales also have jumped.

"We've definitely noticed the increase," said marketing coordinator Sandy May. "This is the third time since I've been here since we've seen things like this happen. . . . I believe the first one was in the late'70s. The second time . . . in the early'80s, seems like."

She said she doesn't anticipate any problems meeting the increased demand.

"We can see the price [of gas] going up, and we know how to react to it since we've been through it before," May said.

Law-enforcement officials say they haven't had a surge in reports of stolen gas, though anecdotal evidence from auto-parts retailers indicates that such thefts -- or at least fear of them -- are on the rise.

Helton said it's likely that locking gas caps will become standard.

"As long as fuel keeps going up, it's probably going to keep selling them," he said.
Debra McCown writes for the Bristol Herald Courier in Bristol.