Biloxi, Mississippi's Floating Casinos built on Barges in Gulf....

[KoKo]

MISSISSIPPI CASINOS
Bay St. Louis Biloxi Greenville Gulfport
Lula Tunica Vicksburg Indian Casino

Mississippi was the third state to legalize riverboat gambling when it was approved by that state’s legislature in 1990. The law restricts casinos to coast waters (including the Bay of St. Louis and the Back Bay of Biloxi) along the Mississippi River and in navigable waters of counties that border the river.

Mississippi law also requires that riverboats be permanently moored at the dock and they are not permitted to cruise. This allows the riverboats to offer 24-hour dockside gambling. The Isle of Capri in Biloxi was the first casino to open on August 1, 1992 followed one month later by The President.

Since the law does not require that the floating vessel actually resemble a boat, almost all of the casinos are built on barges. This gives them the appearance of a land-based building, rather than a riverboat.

The Mississippi Gaming Commission does not break down its slot statistics by individual properties. Rather, they are classified by region. The Coastal region includes Biloxi, Gulfport and Bay Saint Louis. The North region includes Tunica, Greenville and Lula. The Central region includes Vicksburg and Natchez.

With that in mind here’s information, as supplied by the Mississippi Gaming Commission, showing the machine payback percentages for each area’s casinos for the one-year period from July 1, 2003 through June 30, 2004:

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:iNx5wIKUShkJ:www.americancasinoguide.com/miss.shtml+Floating+Casinos+in+Biloxi,+Mississippi&hl=en

[Endangered Specie]

1. Well, this hurricane is going to give them the appearance

of a land based debris field

[hootinholler]

2. That photo shows the hotel...

The casino barge is behind it, past all the shopping opportunities.

-Hoot

[KoKo]

7. Thanks for that info...

blew my mind that something like that could be built on a "barge." Didn't see a photo of the barge on the site when I looked. I'll check it out and remove the photo. I feel a little better now knowing that these hotels are built for storm surge and wind...thanks to more info from poster down on this thread.

[proud2BlibKansan]

3. I was just there last November

Those casinos are beautiful. It is heartbreaking to imagine them being gone 24 hours from now.

[Javaman]

4. can you say...blub blub blub?

[Silverhair]

5. The barges are designed to "blow through".

Yeah. It sounds wierd. The barge itself is well anchored. The casino part is designed as a skeleton with all the walls as blow out panels. As part of their hurricane prep, the close the casino 24 hours in advance, empty ALL the money from all the machines, store all of the money, chips, & tokens in a very secure vault. Then if the storm hits it can blow the casino apart. The skeleton will offer little resistance to the wind. A new casino can be thrown together in an amazingly quick time. However, they withstood 115 mph winds with little damage.

The casino hotels are on land, on huge pilings driven far into the ground. The lower floors are designed to allow a storm surge to flood through them, while the higher floors are designed to withstand storms. I have seen them withstand 115 mph winds of a hurricane.

Of course, a direct hit from a CAT 5 is a different matter.

[KoKo]

6. What happens to all the furniture inside them?

Does that "blow out" also. It's amazing that something can be structured to do that but still all that furniture and debri dumping into the Gulf is kind of disgusting. There's already a big "dead zone" in the Gulf...wonder how big that will get after all that debris from this storm washes out there. It's awful to think about.

One of the weather reporters said the "Beau Rivage" has a bad history since it collapsed and killed 12 people some years ago. A new casino was built on top of that building. I don't know if that's one of the floating ones, though.

And, another reporter said there's a new Neon Guitar that stands straight up on top of one of the hotels that's neon. He said he doesn't think it's going to make it...lots of glass and neon blown away. Owners paid over a million for it, he said.

[Silverhair]

8. Haven't been there since 1999.

Don't know about anything there since then.

The impact of the blow out stuff won't make much difference. If the barge sinks, it would be worse. Also, pretty much all the stuff would stay inside the Mississippi sound.

[merh]

9. This casino was set to open in the next 2 weeks

[KoKo]

10. Don't think there's gonna be much left of it now. It's probably floating

somewhere up the Mississipi or headed over to Florida.