Sunday, July 3, 2011 | 11:10 p.m.
What's happening
The weather put on a show Sunday night that threatened to derail a separate show at Caesars Palace.
But after a 30-minute delay, the resort moved forward with its fireworks display at 9:45 p.m., lighting up the night sky over the Las Vegas Strip.
The display followed a rare severe thunderstorm that swept through the valley, soaking tourists who ran for shelter along the resort corridor. Caesars Palace was the only resort to display fireworks Sunday night.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority is expecting 292,000 visitors for the Fourth of July weekend, up 3.2 percent from 283,000 last year. They are expected to spend an estimated $179 million while they’re here — not including gambling — an increase of 3.4 percent from $173 million in 2010.
The city ranks high on several travel websites’ lists of top destinations for the holiday weekend. Las Vegas is No. 8 on Priceline’s annual Top 50 Fourth of July travel destinations list and ranks fourth on the Travelocity and Orbitz holiday travel indexes. Orbitz officials said Fourth of July travelers seem to be drawn to where the big fireworks displays are this year, including destinations such as New York, Boston and Las Vegas.
Mandalay Bay, the Las Vegas Hilton and Station Casinos properties planned their own fireworks displays Monday night.
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