by Veronique Dupont
NEW YORK, Sept 13 (AFP) - The latest twists and turns from Hurricane Ivan prompted renewed concerns Monday about oil production in the Gulf of Mexico, pushing futures prices sharply higher on global markets.
New York's reference contract, light sweet crude for delivery in October, leapt 1.06 dollars to 43.87 dollars in closing deals.
The price of Brent North Sea crude oil for October deliver jumped 86 cents to close at 41.06 dollars a barrel in London.
The powerful storm, after ripping through the Caribbean, veered farther west than anticipated a few days earlier, posing a greater threat to oil production in the Gulf of Mexico.
"The hurricane will definitely get to the Gulf of Mexico, but the question is where," said AG Edwards oil analyst Bill O'Grady.
"The further west it hits the more major it is."
Deutsche Bank analyst Adam Sieminski said the storm could have an effect for some weeks.
"Twenty-five percent of all US oil and gas production is in the Gulf of Mexico," he said. "It is typical to stop oil wells pumping and shut down rigs and refineries for a few days during a hurricane, and then start them all up again. But when you lose 25 percent for say five days, then prices will be affected for the next four weeks or so with the lack of production and refining."
Oil giants Shell, BP, ExxonMobil and ChevronTexaco evacuated workers from platforms in the eastern Gulf of Mexico because of Hurricane Ivan.
ChevronTexaco said it had already evacuated 667 non-essential personnel and was continuing the process.
BP began pulling some staff from facilities in the Gulf of Mexico over the weekend.
Meanwhile the Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, the biggest US oil import terminal, was reportedly preparing to stop offloading tankers.
OPEC ministers meanwhile began arriving in Vienna ahead of a meeting on Wednesday to discuss output, though analysts said there was little more the cartel could do to bring down prices.
Qatari Oil Minister Abdulah Bin Hamad al-Attiyah said was no shortage of oil in the market.
OPEC is also expected to discuss raising its 22-28 dollar per barrel target price band, which is far below current prices.
"Consensus seems to favour a price band hike (to centre on 30 dollars) and an increase in quota (albeit with little chance of actually higher output)," analysts at Deutsche Bank told clients.
An increase in quotas of one million barrels per day to 27.0 million barrels would still leave OPEC's production ceiling below its actual output of about 28 million barrels a day, excluding Iraq, they said.
Analysts at Barclays Capital said they expected no change to either production or quotas at the OPEC meeting, though the target price band might be altered.