Posted on 08/31/2005 4:14:19 PM PDT by Our_Man_In_Gough_Island
Gulfport, Mississippi, was once a tourist town, filled with beach-goers and gamblers drawn to the casinos on barges permanently moored just offshore.
Now, not a building along this coast has been left unscathed by Hurricane Katrina.
The casinos faired even worse. Their colossal steel frames and hulls are now well inland, hurled across streets and parks by the waves.
One of the casinos that used to be anchored off-shore has been lifted right out of the water.
This badly damaged massive pink carcass, eight stories tall and 700ft (230m) long, is now sitting in a car park 200 yards (182m) inland from the beach.
Nearby, there are a couple of boats, again lying several hundred yards inland.
They are stacked up along with trailer trucks and all sorts of vehicles from the casino. It is a complete mess here.
And of course every house in the area is damaged as well. Debris from the surging waters is everywhere, much of it the personal belongings of the thousands of people who have lost their homes.
Nothing is working here. There is no water, no electricity, no refrigeration, no grocery stores.
No petrol is available from the ground because it is all pumped up by electricity - we brought ours in with us from Florida, about 150 miles (241km) away.
Massive task
Everyone else is just making do with the emergency aid that is starting to flow now.
But the task is massive and it has not even begun to reach the many people who need it here.
Most of the inhabitants have fled their homes Officials are still looking for survivors and finding them all of the time, including at least two children who lost their parents.
More than 100 are feared dead, 30 in one block of flats in the neighbouring city of Biloxi alone.
Hardly anyone is left in their homes, they have either fled or had their properties destroyed. Many are looking for shelter, wandering about dazed.
People will try to get home now but the police will not allow them back because there is a 24-hour curfew. That is leading to confrontations with the police.
It is going to take days, weeks, months or more before they get this back to normal. Casino gambling here provided jobs for 14,000 people.
About $500,000 (£270,000) a year went into the local economy from gambling taxes alone and every single casino has been wrecked.
Every single hotel is uninhabitable. Anyone from out of town who is here covering this has been sleeping in their vehicle. We did that last night.
The wreck of this town is unbelievable.
I wonder if they will be dumb enough to do that again.
LVM
I never have figured out the idea behind gambling boats. Are mobsters unable to cross water and thus putting a casino on a boat makes it wholesome family entertainment, while if it was on dry land it is trouble with a capital T. Maybe casinos have a huge problem with gophers and putting them on boats solves that problem.
That's one way to move them out!
Gophers can't swim! LOL
From what I understand it is the state laws that prohibit "permanent" structures for gambling. Lots of places have "real" boats - moored or taking actual trips.
These were not boats. Big structures on top of, basically, pontoons that they thought were securely anchored down.
I don't understand that, at all.
LVM
The way the riverboat gambling law for the Gulf area was written, the boats have to float. The state is now reconsidering that regulation to allow land based casinos, in light of Katrina.
2 thumbs up for Harrah's, which is paying their 8,000 employees at 3 casinos for 90 days, and have established a $1MM relief fund for their employees.
"2 thumbs up for Harrah's, which is paying their 8,000 employees at 3 casinos for 90 days, and have established a $1MM relief fund for their employees."
I sell promotional items to Harrah's. They are GREAT people to deal with!
Harrah's = True Americans.
"People don't want to come here and pay 200 bucks a night to stay in a nice hotel and look at an oil rig," he said.
"People don't want to come here and pay 200 bucks a night to stay in a nice hotel and look at an oil rig," he said.
'Great Turnout' for Coalition's Anti-Drilling Rally
I sorta' wonder what the DS is saying this week...
Hooray for Harrah's!
I heard that Harrah's was going to keep paying employees but did not know the details. That is a class move, IMO.
Also read somewhere that the Hard Rock Hotel was only weeks from opening - gone. Wow.
LVM
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