How the Mona Vale truck crash caused a major fuel shortage in NSW The Mona Vale crash killed two people. The butterfly effect. One small thing sets in motion a chain of reactions. So how did the ripple effect from one truck crash on the northern beaches of Sydney trigger panic among drivers everywhere? When a petrol tanker from the Cootes Transport fleet tumbled in Mona Vale last week, it caused more than two deaths. Images from the horror crash showed a fireball spewing across the road. That one crash ultimately compromised Cootes' entire operation and left the entire state of NSW with a fuel shortage. This shocking photo of the crash spread across the media. Picture: Tim Pascoe Source: Supplied The incident provoked a safety review of Cootes' fleet. That review revealed major faults in the fleet's trucks. On Saturday, Cootes grounded its entire fleet. It took that measure after safety checks from NSW Roads and Maritime Service and VicRoads led to the discovery of 27 major defects among 80 Cootes LPG tankers, thetelegraph.com.au reports. Cootes Transport grounded its entire fleet on Saturday. So what does this mean? To put it simply: a fuel shortage in NSW. Cootes tankers help supply fuel to outlets like Shell, BP and 7-Eleven. Without their fuel runs, those chains are struggling to meet driver demands. Shortages are already being felt in Sydney, the Blue Mountains and on the Central Coast. The fear of a fuel shortage has also spread to Victoria and Queensland, where The Courier Mail reports a service station in Brisbane raised its price from 140 to 156 cents a litre. Australian Competition and Consumer Commission chairman Rod Sims has warned vendors against price gouging. "Obviously we would always urge ... that people don't take advantage and seek to charge excessive prices," he said, according to the Herald Sun. What happens next? Don't panic: Help is on its way. The message to drivers to the short term is not to panic and certainly not to panic-buy, which only makes the situation worse. Colin Long from the Service Station Association told thetelegraph.com.au the situation "should start to ease at the end of the week and into next week and their (Cootes') trucks start to return." BP spokesman Jamie Jardine added: "The situation at the moment is tight but manageable." Meanwhile the NSW Roads Minister Duncan Gay has called for a national review of trucking safety accreditation and maintenance.