LAS VEGAS -- Firefighters responded Thursday to a smoky fire in a basement construction site at the MGM Grand hotel-casino in Las Vegas.
About 75 construction workers and gamblers in the casino's sports book were evacuated, MGM Grand spokeswoman Yvette Monet said.
No one was reported injured, and the hotel's 5,005 rooms were not evacuated, officials said.
The fire caused an estimated $5,000 in damages, said Bob Leinbach, a spokesman for the Clark County Fire Department
The first Clark County firefighters to arrive after the 11:40 a.m. alarm found that construction workers had extinguished a small fire in a drilling machine at the site below the former EFX Theater. The show closed Dec. 31, and the theater is undergoing renovations in preparation for a new Cirque Du Soleil show expected to debut in the summer of 2004.
Light smoke was visible at noon outside the hotel after firefighters opened vents in the rear of the distinctive green structure on the corner of Las Vegas Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue.
Fire sprinklers in the basement did not activate. Leinbach said the smoky fire did not produce enough heat to set them off.
A Nov. 21, 1980, blaze killed 87 people and injured hundreds at the 2,200-room former MGM Grand hotel-casino, which is now the Bally's hotel-casino.
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