Crude oil prices drop Wednesday

Crude oil prices fell below $61 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange Wednesday on concerns an economic recovery has gone south.

Crude oil prices fell $1.98 to $60.42 per barrel. Heating oil prices lost 0.0394 cents to $1.5491 per gallon. Reformulated blendstock gasoline dropped 0.076 cents to $1.6438 per gallon. Natural gas prices slid 0.007 cents to $3.378 per million British thermal units.

At the pump, the average price for a gallon of regular unleaded gasoline was $2.593 Wednesday, down from Tuesday’s $2.604 a gallon, AAA said.