Only a block away from the US deadliest mass shooting.
I don’t find myself often on tumblr, as it’s a place for me to vent, relieve stress, and to share with the few that follow my experiences. It’s been a few years since I had to do this as I’ve been enjoying my life, and had very little time to post. But last Sunday, Oct 1st, 2017, I was in Las Vegas during the massacre, we were only a block or so away from 22,000 people being fired upon by high-powered rifles by a deranged lunatic. Call him a terrorist, call him a lone-wolf, it doesn’t matter, he still killed dozens upon dozens of people, and have changed thousands of families lives. I can recap most of that day, even though one event stands out in my brain. It started out with me and my girlfriend heading to The Cheesecake factory for an late breakfast/early lunch. We walked around Caesars Palace and down the strip until we reached the famous wax museum. After cashing in on the last of our group-on deal. We headed back to the hotel to change and get ready for some gambling and then to Freemont street. We shared a ride in an uber, and was dropped off at the Golden Nugget for an early dinner. Once we gambled and witnessed the hourly street light show, we took an uber to our show in the New York, New York casino. The Zumanity show we attended is approximately a block from music festival, just close enough to feel the stampede of 20,000+ frightened concert goers, plus the thousands upon thousands of tourists on the strip and in nearby hotels.
It started for us when we were making our way down the steps after the show and reaching the main corridor when all of a sudden, high pitched screams, massive amounts of fleeing people flooded us from the right side. We heard from chaos people yelling, “RUN, there is a shooter!” Amy and I were seperated for a few seconds before I grabbed her hand. Afraid to be part of a massive crowd going outside, we saw a door to the side for service staff. We sprint down the empty hall when a waiter opened a locked kitchen door. We both jumped inside and the kitchen staff was very confused as I explained to them objectively what happened and what people are saying. With there still being no information, and not sure if there was a shooter in NY, NY casino. They had a door in the kitchen that went outside to an adjacent closed restaurant. We decided to get outside and start making our way back to our hotel. We went outside, and it seemed calm. Some people were crying, others were confused, some didn’t know anything was going on. We kept walking through casinos to get down the strip, and every time we entered a casino, there were frantic tourists just learning about the events, became frightened, and starting a stampede. Once we escaped Planet Hollywood after mass confusion and another shooter scare, we decided to make one last try to get to the Flamingo by walking down the strip. Still not sure if there are more than one shooter, where he was, and what to expect, we stayed on our toes. We witnessed a group of tourists walking down an alley to raise their hands at gun point to be searched. Eventually we crossed the last street to the hotel, when SWAT team guided us into the Cromwell, right next to Flamingo, where we were locked down for two hours. The gambling floor was searched for hours for any type of suspicious activity. Around 2am, we were able to leave the backdoor, and slip on over to the Flamingo and back into our hotel room. At that time, we were told only 2 dead and 50 injured. We were to learn only the next morning, we were just minutes away from the United States most deadly mass shootings. The next day, our scheduled plane left in the afternoon. We could see the windows punched out along the side of the Mandalay Bay hotel. A grim sight of the perch that killed so many.
