The Indians arrive on the Strip

The first Indian tribe to operate a casino on the Las Vegas Strip is the Seminoles from Florida.

The tribe, using the vehicle of its ownership of Hard Rock International, has had its acquisition of the Mirage resort from MGM formally approved by the Las Vegas Gaming Commission.

On Friday, the commission gave the nod to the $1.075bn deal that closes today (Monday), giving Hard Rock a $90m per year lease on the site with VICI Properties.

The venue will continue to operate as it is, for the moment, but Hard Rock is planning to remove the iconic erupting volcano attraction from the sidewalk and replace it with a huge guitar. 

The 3,000 bedrooms will be totally refurbished under the plan from Hard Rock and with the extension to the towers will be increased to 3,700 rooms.

The guitar will be around 700ft in height, similar to that outside several of the tribe’s casinos (the one at Atlantic City is pictured). The casino size will be doubled to 174,000sq.ft, with the current 836 slots increasing to 2,000 and tables from 51 to 212.