Former President Donald Trump’s Atlantic City hotel—once one of the hottest attractions in the area—was demolished on Wednesday morning when 3,000 sticks of dynamite were used to create “a controlled implosion.”
The Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino was formally shuttered in 2014 and the crumbling structure left behind had since become a danger to the community. City officials last year declared the building to be an “imminent hazard” after several of the 34-story building’s panels peeled off and plummeted at least 15 stories to the ground.
Seats to the demolition were sold, with Caesars Atlantic City offering special packages for people who wanted to watch the last vestige of Trump’s gaming empire literally come crashing to the ground.
Atlantic City native Jennifer Owen, who spent $575 to win an auction for a front-row seat to the event that included breakfast and a pavilion with an ocean view told the New York Times it was “an end of a not-so-great era” for the once storied gaming city.
The demolition was caught on video.
“It’s symbolic for sure. Him. Everything ending,” Owen said.
Following his second impeachment, former President Trump was acquitted Saturday of the charge that he incited the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.
City officials last year filed an action in New Jersey Superior Court seeking injunctive relief that required the immediate demolition of the building following several instances of debris falling off of the building. Atlantic City Mayor Marty Small Sr. made tearing down the dangerous “eyesore” a primary objective of his campaign, calling it “an embarrassment” to the city.
“Now that all the hoopla is done we have to clean up eight stories worth of debris, but I’m not concerned about that. I’m concerned about the rebuild,” Mayor Small said during his State of the City address last week.
The building was owned by billionaire Carl Icahn, who purchased Trump’s former casino (which has been closed since 2014) through bankruptcy proceedings in 2016. Last month, Icahn cancelled an auction for the right to push the button to implode the building citing security concerns. The money, which would have gone to the Boys & Girls Club of Atlantic City, drew a high bid of $175,000, according to the New York Times. A spokesperson for Icahn Enterprises told the Times that one of Icahn’s foundations would donate an equivalent sum to the charity to “replace the auction proceeds that they would have purportedly received.”
Previously, a Nor’easter storm had torn away pieces of the former hotel in 2018, scattering debris that reached the city’s storied boardwalk.
[image via Image via Amy Rosenberg/Twitter screengrab]
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