{"id":16480,"date":"2015-07-27T10:27:16","date_gmt":"2015-07-27T18:27:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/?p=16480"},"modified":"2015-07-27T10:27:16","modified_gmt":"2015-07-27T18:27:16","slug":"up-in-smoke-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/up-in-smoke-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Up in smoke"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/zYlPMJJo1Vg\" width=\"450\" height=\"253\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>We know that <strong>Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas<\/strong> owner <strong>Blackstone Group<\/strong> wanted to change perceptions of the property but I don&#8217;t this is <a href=\"http:\/\/abcnews.go.com\/US\/fire-rages-cosmopolitan-hotel-las-vegas\/story?id=32685666\" target=\"_blank\">what they had in mind<\/a>. One measly cigarette <a href=\"http:\/\/lasvegassun.com\/news\/2015\/jul\/25\/fire-sends-plume-smoke-over-las-vegas-strip\/\" target=\"_blank\">seems to have been all it took<\/a> to send the resort&#8217;s <strong>Bamboo Pool<\/strong> area up in a cloud of dense <!--more-->black smoke, the blaze fueled avidly\u00a0by the cabanas and artificial palm trees on the deck. Thankfully, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2015\/07\/25\/us\/las-vegas-hotel-fire\/\" target=\"_blank\">only two people were injured<\/a>, although it could have been worse, judging from the blase attitudes of Cosmo hotel guests who casually filmed the blaze from their hotel windows.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/VbCyNHk-I3M\" width=\"450\" height=\"253\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>As hotel guest <strong>Christopher Thomas<\/strong> said of the half-hour crisis, &#8220;It was one of those things where I thought, \u2018Drop everything and get the hell out.\u2019\u201d Kudos, by the way, to the <strong>Clark County Fire Department<\/strong> for a superb job of damage control in what must be the scariest scenario they&#8217;ve faced since the <strong>Monte Carlo<\/strong> fire. (Cosmo staff <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reviewjournal.com\/news\/las-vegas\/cosmopolitan-pool-reopens-after-saturday-fire\" target=\"_blank\">got mixed reviews<\/a> for their performance during the crisis.) The injury toll could have been much worse, as the pool area was &#8220;fully loaded&#8221; at the time &#8212; as may have been whichever asset decided to flick a lit cigarette into the area.<\/p>\n<p>Showing \u00a0indecent haste, Blackstone <a href=\"http:\/\/lasvegassun.com\/news\/2015\/jul\/26\/bamboo-pool-cosmopolitan-reopens-after-fire-14th-f\/?utm_source=mostpopular&amp;utm_medium=banner&amp;utm_campaign=mostRead\" target=\"_blank\">reopened the charred pool area<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Cosmo-fire.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-16481\" src=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Cosmo-fire-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"Cosmo fire\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Cosmo-fire-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Cosmo-fire-150x113.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/07\/Cosmo-fire.jpg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a>less than 24 hours later, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/news\/us-news\/las-vegas-cosmopolitan-pool-deck-reopens-after-fire-n398676\" target=\"_blank\">even as the 14th floor remained otherwise closed<\/a>. I know I&#8217;d sure like to relax in what looks like the remnants of a forest fire, wouldn&#8217;t you? Shame on original owner <strong>Deutsche Bank<\/strong> for installing the fire-friendly faux palms, which <strong>Clark County<\/strong> Fire Chief <strong>Greg Cassell<\/strong> described as &#8220;like solid gasoline to us,&#8221; and here&#8217;s hoping that Blackstone learns from the near-tragedy and replaces them with something of a much safer caliber.<\/p>\n<p>As for the fire department&#8217;s speedy containment of the conflagration, <a href=\"http:\/\/news.yahoo.com\/firefighters-extinguish-fire-at-the-cosmopolitan-hotel-in-las-vegas-203106264.html\" target=\"_blank\">a spokeswoman said<\/a>,\u00a0\u201cIt was an outside fire and we had good access, so it wasn\u2019t like fighting an inside structure fire. We practice and drill all the time at our hotels and casinos here.\u00a0We know how to get our hose lines up quickly.\u201d Now <em>that<\/em> is genuinely reassuring.<\/p>\n<p>* With <strong>Macao<\/strong>, faltering <strong>Galaxy Entertainment<\/strong> is placing a side bet on <strong>Monaco<\/strong>, purchasing a 5% stake in casino operator\u00a0<strong>Societe des Bains de Mer et du Cercle des Etrangers a Monaco<\/strong>. Although majority owned by Monaco itself, SBM <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bloomberg.com\/news\/articles\/2015-07-25\/galaxy-buys-stake-in-monaco-casinos-operator-as-macau-slumps\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"broken_link\">is an attractive investment vehicle at the moment<\/a>, another 5% having been purchased by\u00a0<strong>LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton SE<\/strong>. As a Galaxy sp0kesman put it,\u00a0\u201cWe see it as a potential to develop a strategic long-term partnership with them.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>* Did you know that <strong>Jack L. Warner<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.casino.org\/news\/glpi-acquires-pinnacle-properties-in-4-74-billion-deal\" target=\"_blank\">was the founding father<\/a> of what is now <strong>Pinnacle Entertainment<\/strong>? I didn&#8217;t. Live and learn.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We know that Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas owner Blackstone Group wanted to change perceptions of the property but I don&#8217;t this is what they had in mind. One measly cigarette seems to have been all it took to send the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/up-in-smoke-2\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[66,140,67,22,62,125,30,9],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16480"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16480"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16480\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16482,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16480\/revisions\/16482"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16480"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16480"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/stiffs-and-georges\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16480"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}