United States - The Colonial Pipeline, based in Georgia, carries almost half of the fuel consumed on the East Coast and has been shut since Friday, after what experts said was the worst cyber attack to date on U.S. Infrastructure. The company said it was hit by what's called a "ransomware attack," where hackers get into their computer system.

Youngstown State University economist Sarah Jenyk said timing is key when it comes to how this could impact gas prices. Jenyk said we may see some upward pressure on price since demand is already up with more people traveling, so a decrease in supply would cause a bigger disruption.

"The impact of the pipeline... if it continues on for a week or longer, we will see probably see a pretty drastic increase in prices because of it," Jenyk said, "If it only lasts a few days, and it sounds like they're working through it already, we shouldn't see a major impact long term on gas prices going through the summer."

Jenyk said if this goes beyond a week, she predicts gas will be over $3 dollars per gallon.

"We would be looking at how that would affect consumer spending," she said, "So if we do start to see gas prices go up substantially, then that tends to cause other prices to go up as well since gas is so essential and it transports so many of our goods."

Jenyk said she does not think there's any cause for alarm just yet, and added as soon as the company verifies their database is secure, they will operate the pipeline immediately.

As of now in Youngstown, gas is about $2.86 cents.