Oil prices steady below $82 a barrel

---

LONDON, Sept 21(AP) : Oil prices fell on profit-taking Friday but were expected to hold near record levels as traders kept a watchful eye on a potential tropical storm brewing off the west coast of Florida.
U.S. forecasters warned that a weather system swirling could make landfall as a tropical storm over the weekend. Computer models show possible tracks across Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana.
"I expect a lot of support for pricing as traders don't want to be caught short ahead of the weekend," said Victor Shum of Purvin & Gertz in Singapore. "And folks will continue to watch how this storm develops over the course of trading."
Light, sweet crude for November delivery lost 36 cents to $81.42 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange by midday in Europe.
The October crude contract hit a record high for the fourth straight session before expiring Thursday up $1.39 at $83.32 a barrel. It rose as high as $83.90 in intraday trading.
As a precaution against the storm, oil industry workers left five production platforms in the Gulf, and three drilling rigs have been evacuated, according to the U.S. Minerals Management Service. But the evacuations are likely temporary, given that oil and gas platforms are built to withstand smaller storms - even of tropical strength, analysts say.
Also, the storm may be headed inland, away from oil installations.
"Given its calculated path that could take it to Alabama as well as to Louisiana, we will keep it as a risk rather than bet the house on it," said Oliver Jakob, managing director of Petromatrix in Switzerland.
The temporary closure of about a quarter of the Gulf of Mexico's daily oil production lent an extra boost to the oil market's already record-breaking run, because traders view U.S. crude inventories as tight. Last week, crude inventories declined.
But the real drive behind the rally, many analysts say, is an influx of speculative "nontraditional" capital into energy commodities, an inflow that increases when the dollar falls. On Thursday, the dollar fell to yet another record low against the euro, and dropped to the same value as the Canadian dollar for the first time since November 1976. A weak dollar supports oil prices by making futures cheaper for foreign investors.
Some analysts, however, felt that a downward correction may be on the horizon after the new all-time highs.
"We are increasingly concerned about the potential for a near-term correction," said analysts at Barclays Capital in London quoted by Dow Jones Newswires.
November Brent crude lost 31 cents to $78.78 a barrel on the ICE futures exchange in London.
Nymex heating oil futures dropped 1.20 cents to $2.2489 a gallon while gasoline prices fell 0.66 cents to $2.1285 a gallon.
Natural gas lost 6.5 cents to $5.943 per 1,000 cubic feet. Natural gas prices have not been affected by National Hurricane Center forecasts that a tropical depression or storm could soon form in the Gulf, where there is a concentration of natural gas infrastructure.