When the hurricane hits, there is no other choice than to close up shop. This year, with Hurricane Irene set to hit Atlantic City, the casinos in the city are set to close. This means huge losses for the casinos even if the shutdown is only for a few hours. Losses of about three to four million dollars are expected.
The city officials declared a mandatory evacuation of the premises from 6 AM. Out of the 11 casinos, many are still planning to keep their rooms and restaurants open for those people stranded on the island. Gambling on the other hand has been shut down completely.
The city has 11 major casinos and all of them are preparing for the big hurricane soon to hit the city. They will be closing down business till Irene passes. In the past 33 years, such a total shutdown has only happened twice before. The casino’s business was legalized only in 1978 in the state of New Jersey. Since then, the state has been raking in huge revenues from the business. The first shutdown came in 1985 when Hurricane Gloria hit the island. Gloria being a Category 4 storm left extensive damages in most of the areas it hit. The damages caused by the hurricane was said to amount to $500 million. The second shutdown came in the form of a State government directive in 2006. Now the third shutdown is here, thanks to Hurricane Irene.
The Implications of a Casino Shutdown
A shutdown affects a lot of people. It does not just affect the casino owners. It affects all the others associated with the casino. There will be hundreds of workers in these casinos; many of them work on daily wages. Their means of livelihood is affected. Casinos have many suppliers. This could be suppliers of flowers to adorn the rooms and halls, suppliers of food, suppliers of specialized items like caviar, and so on. A shut down means that the casino would not be requiring these items for those days. The items would be wasted and spoiled. The supplier may incur heavy losses due to this. In short, a shutdown of the casino doors would mean a shutdown for all people associated with the casino. Their income is also hit in a big way and heavy losses are incurred. Sometimes these losses are so high that there will be no recovery point for the sufferer. The casinos as such recover quickly as their business is huge and a few days of good house wins would make up the loss. It is the smaller suppliers who rely on their association with the casinos that really suffer.
Be it Hurricane Irene or Hurricane Gloria, a complete shutdown means terrible losses for casinos and associated people. Casinos try and avoid the shutdown as far as possible. But when the situation is beyond human control, there is no choice than to incur the losses and hope to resurface later.