Friday, Nov. 9, 2001 | 10:59 a.m.
If all goes as planned, a cascading American flag made of fireworks will light the Las Vegas sky during the first minutes of 2002, the finale to a weekend-long celebration that planners are calling "America's Party."
Planners with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority and Las Vegas Events plan to make the fireworks display an annual event that will help serve as a tool to market Las Vegas as the premier New Year's destination in the world.
"We know what Las Vegas has to offer as a destination, with the entertainment, hotels and a reputation for safety," Las Vegas Events President Pat Christenson said at a Thursday press conference at the Thomas & Mack Center. "We wanted to brand all the things that make Las Vegas the place to be for New Year's.
"America's Party will be the theme for New Year's in Las Vegas from now on, and the fireworks display is going to be the crown of the celebration."
This is the second year in a row fireworks will be a part of Las Vegas' New Year's celebration, after local political leaders were left with a sense that Las Vegas' Y2K celebration had left visitors wondering why there hadn't been fireworks or some other event to mark the passing of the millennium.
Rossi Ralenkotter, LVCVA vice president of marketing, said that the idea behind "America's Party" is to advertise New Year's in Las Vegas as a weekend-long celebration, and an event that is not to be missed.
"Las Vegas has always been the place to be for New Year's, and we want to continue that trend," Ralenkotter said. "Our advertising campaign will not only focus on the great food and entertainment, but the fireworks and the great values in Las Vegas.
"We want to tell people, 'It's time for you to come to Las Vegas.' "
The $500,000 fireworks show will feature a different theme every year, with this year's display titled, "Star Spangled New Year 2002."
The show, put on by Fireworks by Grucci, will last for seven minutes and 11 seconds, and will be choreographed to music, including "Auld Lang Syne" and "God Bless America." The fireworks will be shot from 15 locations up and down The Strip, and a separate show will be held under the cover at the Fremont Street Experience, said Phil Grucci, who is producing the show.
"We are treating each property as a stage, and we're going to unite them into the largest pyrotechnic theater in the world," Grucci said. "During 'God Bless America' red and white pyrotechnics will be shot into the air to make bunting, and then blue star shells will be shot over that to form an American flag that will stretch from one end of The Strip to the other."
The show will stretch from the Mandalay Bay in the south to the Stratosphere in the north.
The Grucci family has been working with pyrotechnics since 1850, and produced their first show in Las Vegas in the '70s at the Sands.
Ralenkotter said that the LVCVA has done research into the mood of the country in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks, and said that New Year's in Las Vegas could provide people an escape from their everyday lives.
"Before the events of Sept. 11 Las Vegas was the escape destination of choice, and now it has become the escape destination of need," Ralenkotter said.
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