After leaving, Mr Ho reportedly summoned his inner circle and demanded action: “We are Chinese, and we will not be disgraced. “When Stanley Ho went up the escalator and saw the Sands gaming floor, his jaw dropped,” a witness recalls. “The cake is going to be bigger and bigger, and we all could have a share.īut privately he had a different reaction. “We have the opportunity to learn from one another,” Stanley Ho, who built the Lisboa and held Macau’s gaming monopoly for 40 years, told reporters at the Sands opening behind a broad grin.
“This was a must-see event that had last happened in 1970 when Lisboa opened,” longtime University of Macau gaming law professor Jorge Godinho says. “He looked like a superhero, this big gweilo trying to catch these little Chinese people.ĭespite those hiccups, 40,000 people visited Sands Macao on opening day, nearly triple its official capacity, marveling at the Paul Steelman-designed interior with high ceilings above 277 table games and 405 slot machines and enjoying the entertainment right there on the bright casino floor while employees dispensed tea, cards and HK$100 chips with smiles rather than scowls. “I remember the head of security, this big Australian guy, trying to stop people from getting on and help the ones coming down,” a Macau resident in the crowd recalls. The crowd surged toward the escalator and within minutes, the overburdened machine halted and bodies lurched backward. People at the bottom of the escalator tumbled like bowling pins. In all, 16 doors were smashed and shoved aside to let people enter Sands Macao, putting conventional ribboncuttings to shame. People outside saw what was happening and joined in. Guards began pulling furiously on the doors. The only option was to yank the doors inward and snap them off their hinges. “I want these doors open now!”īut the doors were designed to swing outward, a physical impossibility with the crowd pressed against them. Security feared that people would be crushed, hardly the ideal opening day headline for Macau’s first American-operated casino. sent from Las Vegas for the opening. LVS Executive Vice President Brad Stone slipped down the escalator from the second-level casino to the lobby and saw thousands of people had surged past barricades and were pressed against the glass entrance doors. Just before 2 p.m., during a reception for invited guests, security began “freaking out,” according to an executive of Las Vegas Sands Corp.
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Around noon, a rumor spread that guests would receive free chips worth MOP200 (US$25), swelling the crowd.
on Tuesday, 18th May, 2004, a crowd was already forming on the street, nine hours before the casino’s scheduled grand opening. Ten years ago, Sands Macao’s opening changed the course of Macau and global gaming historyĪs Sands Macao employees began arriving for work around 7 a.m.
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