Thousands gather on Strip for fireworks

Ken Ritter

Monday, Jan. 1, 2001 | 9:25 a.m.

Fireworks echoed across the Strip as hundreds of thousands of New Year's Eve revelers gathered for a display officials promised would be the biggest and best ever.

"We saved the best for last," said newlywed Kim McCosker. "The atmosphere is electric."

McCosker and her husband, Paul, planned to spend the night on the strip before flying home to Australia at 5 a.m. They had been touring the United States since Nov. 25.

Las Vegas police arrested 82 people - 48 adults and 34 juveniles - mostly for minor offenses, said Lt. Mark Joseph.

Doug Bradford, Clark County spokesman, said based on the number of booked hotel rooms and an estimated 100,000 non-staying visitors, the city had more than 350,000 people to witness what has been dubbed the "Big Bang," the biggest fireworks display in the nation. There were no fireworks last year due to Y2K safety concerns. The crowd last year was estimated at 251,000.

Bradford said county workers expected to pick up 150 tons of trash after the gathering.

Douglas County sheriff's deputies reported 10 arrests and one fireworks injury in Lake Tahoe. Sheriff's spokesman Richard Mirgon said as many as 50,000 people were in Lake Tahoe, slightly more than last year.

About $500,000 worth of fireworks were launched at midnight from 11 hotel-casinos on the Las Vegas Strip, two ground sites and beneath a dome covering a five-block casino mall.

"Whoooo!" whooped Sam Markowitz as he and his brother, and friends from San Diego, stepped from a packed bus onto a crowded sidewalk in front of the Sahara Hotel-Casino before the pyro-technic show.

Markowitz, sporting a puffy red, white and blue Yankee-Doodle hat, and a lightweight orange sweater, declared himself ready to "meet some women, win some money, and have a great time with my friends."

The 24-year-old also was celebrating finishing his Navy tour of duty Dec. 9 aboard the aircraft carrier John C. Stennis.

To Mark Markowitz, a 32-year-old New York City musician, the 58-degree weather seemed balmy.

"This is not the year to be in Manhattan. This is the place to be," he said.

The Las Vegas tourism agency used hotel taxes to pay for the event, which they hoped would erase memories of a Year 2000 celebration that Mayor Oscar Goodman labeled a "dud."

High hotel rates, and fears of Y2K terrorism combined to discourage crowds last year, even though hotels dropped rates at the last minute.

Charles Davis, a rancher from Alberta, Canada, remembered that room rates doubled last year.

This year, he, his wife, Marge, and their 7-year-old daughter, Kaitlyn, found their New Year's visit far more affordable.

"And we didn't get to see fireworks last year," Marge Davis said.