Running from 1990 until 2003 after Roy Horn’s tiger attack, the show was fundamental to the resort’s development. Siegfried and Roy’s show was synonymous with The Mirage. The opening of the Luxor and MGM Grand in 1993 and Bellagio in 1998 followed in The Mirage’s footsteps - with each resort trying to outdo the last. The completion and opening of the hotel-casino is considered the start of Las Vegas’ mega-resort boom, inspiring developers to top The Mirage’s rare white tigers and volcano show.

Crowds got so large, restrictions had to be put in place. He then bought the name Mirage from two motels in the Las Vegas Valley.Ĭonstruction took two years to complete, and on its first weekend open, the hotel-casino saw about 750,000 guests visit. Steve Wynn consulted fourth-graders at Vegas Verde Elementary School to help come up with the resort’s name. Instead, it was on the property’s other features like its Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat, which closed on Tuesday permanently after three dolphins died this year.īut before the resort opened, it needed a name. 22, 1989, the focus was not on gaming or hotel suites.

(And, by the way, the volcano is not expected to close under new management, according to MGM Resorts.) The Mirage will switch ownership from MGM Resorts International to Hard Rock International at the end of the year, and eventually the casino will undergo and brand change, but its volcanic legacy is one Las Vegas won’t soon forget. The volcano, which has been a free attraction on the Strip since 1989, erupts nightly at the top of the hour from 8 p.m. Fire belches from the volcano as flames dance across the surface of the water in front of The Mirage hotel-casino on the Strip on Thursday, June 21, 2007, in Las Vegas.

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