Tropicana Demolition Details Released, You Aren’t Invited

By Scott Roeben, on September 25 2024
4 min read 2 comments
Las Vegas

Bally’s Corp. and the Sacramento A’s have released further details about the demolition of the Tropicana. As previously shared, the demolition happens Oct. 9, 2024 at 2:30 a.m.

Despite the requisite hoopla, the time of the demolition is intended to deter people from attending the event. A statement says, “The public is encouraged to check local listings for live broadcasts of the implosion, as there are no public viewing areas.”

That’s just the first of a cavalcade of sad trombones when it comes to the Trop demolition. Gird for a quick reality check.

They’ve mitigated most of the asbestos, so chill, you big baby.

First, some details about the demolition itself. The demolition marks the end of a former Las Vegas icon. Trop opened in 1957 and has been in slow decline ever since.

The demolition of the Trop will feature a show with 555 drones.

We are not a numerology person, but the Internet says the number 555 is considered an “angel number” that represents change, transformation and personal growth. It can also symbolize good luck. What a perfect number of drones for a casino demolition! We used to make fun of numerology because it’s superstitious, mystical nonsense. Then we started gambling and now we are fully invested in myriad superstitions and nonsense (“If the dice touch someone’s hands, we all lose!”). Please accept our apology, numerologists. The same does not apply to astrology, of course, as that’s still profoundly and undeniably stupid.

Two towers will be demolished at once, each 23 stories tall. The buildings have been stripped down to their bones.

Here are some of the demolition nerd details that will appear as “fun facts” for decades to come: “The structural steel-framed Paradise Tower will feature 220 cut-point locations loaded with 490 pounds of explosives, while the reinforced concrete-framed Club Tower will have 1,130 boreholes filled with 1,700 pounds of explosives. A total of 22,000 lineal feet of detonating cord will be used to initiate the implosion in both towers at the end of the fireworks and drone presentation. The demolition sequence will start with the Paradise Tower, and both structures are expected to collapse within approximately 22 seconds after the implosion button is pressed.”

We can confirm 22 seconds is about right if we’re using the demolition of Tropicana as a metaphor for sex with us. Although, who would do that, you puerile weirdo?

Here’s a close-up of the boreholes being filled with explosives. This is the Club Tower (we have a 50/50 shot of being right about this), which is concrete-framed, which you would’ve known if you hadn’t just breezed through the information two paragraphs ago, probably because of your aversion to being dubbed a “nerd.”

The supports are wrapped with cloth to contain fragments send flying by the explosives. Thanks to our Strip-roaming pal @JamesinLasVegas for the pics.

Here’s another look at preparations for the Tropicana implosion.

Yes, we used to obsess over casino demolitions, but if you’ve seen one pile of rubble, you’ve seen them all.

While the public isn’t invited, the demolition event will feature representatives of “the Bally’s Corporation (Chairman Soohyung Kim), the Athletics, Tropicana Las Vegas, Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA), the Clark County Commission and Controlled Demolition, Inc.”

They will be joined by Las Vegas dignitaries and invited guests. No, we are not one of the invited guests. We are also not a dignitary, mostly because we refuse to wear suits.

So, about the rest of those sad trombones: Bally’s Corp. has no money to build a resort on the Tropicana site. The A’s don’t have funding to build a ballpark on the Tropicana site.

It’s not rocket science.

That means, despite all the hoopla and unbridled optimism (and parroting of what they’re being spoon fed) of our local media outlets, they’re imploding a perfectly good casino to make room for what is likely to be parking lot for years to come.

It’s all very complicated, with public money involved potentially, and the A’s playing in Sacramento for at least three years and the departure of the A’s from Oakland being a shitshow and the A’s owner being universally loathed (see below) and Bally’s being bailed of its financial quandary in Chicago but nobody knowing if the Trop land owner, GPLI, will chip in for a new hotel on the site (consensus is no), and people still thinking Bally’s Corp. has something to do with the Bally’s casino (that’s now the Horseshoe casino, except for one of its towers which is a Paris tower) and us becoming a sports expert quoted in Sports Illustrated (“Vital Vegas has been spot-on with their sources on the A’s ballpark in Las Vegas every step of the way”) because that’s how upside down and crazy-making this still-unfolding debacle has been.

So, since you’re not invited, what’s the best place to watch the Tropicana implosion? Probably from your room at one of the neighboring hotels. Our top tip: Do not stand too close to the window.

Our friend James scouted some possible views, including from hotel parking lot structures, but it seems likely those hotels aren’t going to let people watch from their parking garages.

If watching this implosion in person is really important to you, get to The Strip early so you’ll have time to move to an alternate location if needed. We’ll probably try a view from across the street and down the road.

But other than that, big implosion party nobody’s invited to except some local journalists (who are terrible tippers at media events, so be forewarned, cocktail servers), so let’s make some old-school boom-boom and get to whatever’s next, already, probably not baseball.