Crude oil prices plummeted Tuesday as US refiners got ready to restart plants and other Gulf Coast petroleum operations slowly recovered.

Light sweet crude for delivery in October, New York's main contract, fell sharply by 1.61 dollars to close at 65.96 dollars a barrel. Gasoline futures plunged by 12.87 cents to settle at 2.055 dollars a gallon on Nymex.

In London, the price of Brent North Sea crude for October delivery dropped 18 cents to 64.67 dollars a barrel from Monday's close on the International Petroleum Exchange.

The US government has already released nine million barrels of oil from its 700 million-barrel Strategic Petroleum Reserve to selected companies in need. Last week, the International Energy Agency said its members would release 60 million barrels of crude products over an initial period of 30 days.

While half of the eight refineries shut down by Hurricane Katrina were restarting operations and another four were expected to do so soon, 58 percent of normal oil production remains shut down, the federal Minerals Management Service said. Some 12.7 million barrels of oil output has been lost since Aug. 26.

Katrina has shut down an estimated 92 percent of crude production and 83 percent of natural gas output in the Gulf of Mexico -- which accounts for nearly 30 percents of total US oil output.