Gambling boats fail to catch on

Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2000 | 10:45 a.m.

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

BOSTON -- Running an offshore gambling boat in Massachusetts has proven to be a risky proposition.

Of the five boats that launched in state waters during the last two years, just one still ships out daily. The rest have disappeared like a bankroll at a blackjack table.

Boat owners in Gloucester and Provincetown found it difficult to convince customers to risk seasickness, bad weather and close quarters rather than travel to glitzy Connecticut casinos Foxwoods and Mohegan Sun.

"I've talked to a few people, and not many of them want to go out on a boat," said David Tremblay, vice president of Tremblay Tours, which buses Bay Staters to Foxwoods. "I think they want to see the glamour of a casino, and you don't get that on a ship."

The Gloucester operation closed last season. The Provincetown boat, the Midnight Gambler, stopped running this month. The one offshore gambling boat that survives, the S.S. Horizon's Edge out of Lynn, has succeeded by copying the casino formula of offering a myriad of entertainment options, like dinner, dancing and a band.

The Horizon's Edge is 186 feet long.

"It's a mini cruise ship, more than twice the size of the Gloucester boats, with many other things to do besides gambling," Horizon spokesman Paul Halloran told the Boston Globe.