called Hurricane Katrina the single-biggest disaster ever to hit the casino industry.

90 bridges were destroyed, cutting off east-west access to the Biloxi and Gulfport communities.Īt the Global Gaming Expo in Las Vegas a few weeks after the storm, then-American Gaming Association CEO Frank Fahrenkopf Jr. The Gulf Coast was in shambles for years. Many of those gaming employees lost their homes. The human toll included the loss of 17,000 casino and hospitality jobs. Some of the machines - with blackjack tables, slot tokens, gaming chips and other gambling equipment - ended up at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico. More than 19,000 slot machines were rendered useless and had to be destroyed. Seawater and debris inundated hotel rooms, convention areas and restaurants. Other casino barges were destroyed or heavily damaged at their docks. The massive storm had driven the barge three-quarters of a mile down the beach, where it came to rest on the north side of U.S. 29, 2005, leaving behind blown-out buildings and a stark landscape.Ī few days after the storm subsided, Ferrucci returned to the marina to find the President gone. Louis and Biloxi.Īll were destroyed by the Category 5 hurricane, which packed wind gusts exceeding 135 mph and pushed a 35-foot storm surge well inland on Aug.

The President was one of 13 casinos in a 40-mile stretch of picturesque U.S. “You could tell that this one was different.” “I had been through this several times,” said Ferrucci, who has experienced his share of hurricanes in 22 years as a Biloxi casino operator. Two days later, he was told to evacuate the area: Hurricane Katrina was bearing down on the Mississippi Gulf Coast. John Ferrucci recalls standing at the Broadwater Marina on a humid, late summer morning in August 2005, trying to determine the best way to slip the moorings of the President Casino barge and float it 35 miles west to Hancock County, where it would reopen as the Silver Slipper.

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