Virus prompts look back to hit after 9/11

Officials wonder how long effects will linger

When terrorists flew commercial airliners into the World Trade Center in New York and the Pentagon in Washington on Sept. 11, 2001, Las Vegas couldn’t escape the economic fallout that followed.

And it’s unlikely Las Vegas will be able to dodge the economic damage inflicted by the coronavirus outbreak, either.

Business and academic leaders are seeing as many differences as similarities between the two calamities, which delivered gut punches to the region’s travel and tourism industries.

When 9/11 occurred, federal government authorities immediately closed the nation’s airspace and grounded planes. Visitors to Las Vegas were stranded in their hotels, and the stunned public watched television coverage of one of the tallest buildings in the world being reduced to rubble.

By contrast, there have been no explosions or dramatic footage from the coronavirus outbreak, except for the thousands of people wearing surgical masks in some public settings.

While travelers to Las Vegas were glued to television monitors in casinos to watch the World Trade Center

’ Stephen Miller Business professor and director of UNLV’s Center for Business and Economic Research

FALLOUT

responding to the outbreak. And we’ve reported that some events are waiting to make a decision, like next month’s 2020 NFL draft and May’s Electric Daisy Carnival, two massive events that would further damage the city economically if they were to go away. (Neither event had canceled at the time this column was printed).

What’s hard to reconcile is that everyday working men and women get hurt the most by false reports, because they’re going to lose tip

money from our visitors.

It’s also important to note that some of the bloggers and social media amateurs are the same people who complain bitterly that the professional media don’t acknowledge them when they report a “scoop.”

Sadly, they’re often as wrong as they are right, which is one of the reasons we call and verify information before posting it online and do not rely on random posts and unnamed sources.

As for the rumor about The Mirage closing its doors, I emailed the state Gaming Control Board with an inquiry, since there’s a gaming regulation that addresses closures by

licensed operators.

Under Regulation 9, a licensee ceasing operations because of natural disaster is required to notify the Control Board of the circumstance, the anticipated duration of the closure and whether the licensee plans to continue operations once the problem is over.

Licensees are within their rights to close portions of a hotel or casino without a notification.

There also are protocols and procedures outlined in regulations for the planned closure of a casino property that involve the surrender of a gaming license.

Clearly, The Mirage has no intention of abandoning its license. It has no plans to close as a result of what could become an economic disaster. Heck, even a phone call or an email to MGM Resorts International inquiring about a pending closure could have done the trick.

Instead, the posting of a false rumor ratcheted up the anxiety in a community already nervous and on edge.

That’s what gives social media a bad name.