Demolition experts prepared New Frontier for final fall

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The New Frontier was just one-fifth the size of the Stardust but it required nearly twice as much in explosives to bring down as the former Strip resort needed.

The New Frontier was built with large amounts of reinforcing steel, running vertically and horizontally, up its concrete columns, Controlled Demolition President Mark Loizeaux said Monday, just hours before the resort was scheduled to be imploded at 2:30 a.m. today.

Also, the hotel tower, which was rectangular with an open air atrium at its center, had three separate supporting cores running the height of the tower that contained elevator bays and stairwells, he said.

For Loizeaux, getting the supporting cores to fall properly was the biggest challenge. The north and center cores needed to fall to the south, while the southern core needed to fall to the north so the rest of the property would tumble like a house of cards, he said.

Loizeaux and Controlled Demolition are not new to demolitions. His company been involved in every major hotel implosion in the Las Vegas area since the Dunes in 1993.

New York-based Elad Group bought the property in May for $1.2 billion and closed it July 16.

Elad, which is controlled by Israeli billionaire Yitzhak Tshuva, plans to build a $5 billion mixed-use project modeled after New York’s Plaza Hotel.

The project still needs approval from the county’s planners and commissioners.

The Review-Journal is planning to post video of the implosion on its Web site later today.

Contact reporter Arnold M. Knightly at aknightly@reviewjournal.com or (702) 477-3893.