Posted on: October 19, 2022, 11:01h.
Last updated on: October 19, 2022, 11:01h.
Officials continue to search for the cause of last week’s truck explosion inside Oklahoma’s Choctaw Casino parking garage. A half-dozen nearby cars also were damaged in a resulting fire.
The explosion and fire did not appear to be started from foul play, investigators said after last Thursday’s incident.
There was extensive damage to several vehicles parked in the casino’s north garage second floor. But no injuries were reported.
The truck’s owner, Jason Wilkerson, was at the casino and was watching a football game and eating dinner with his brother and father, KOKH, a local TV station, reported.
He heard an announcement over a loudspeaker in which a Ford F150 truck matching the description of his vehicle was mentioned.
He went to check on the truck. Portions had melted and it was heavily damaged by flames.
Not much left of it,” Wilkerson told KXII, another local station. “It looked like it had blown up.”
He described it as being “completely destroyed.”
He recalled that parking in the garage was a “tight squeeze” for the motorists. His vehicle and the car next to it were “maybe a foot apart.”
Until he gets an insurance payment, Wilkinson will use his son’s truck.
Choctaw Casino is located in Durant, Okla. It is operated by the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma.
Foxwoods Casino Garage Fire
Last week, in an unrelated incident, several vehicles in Connecticut’s Foxwoods Resort Casino’s parking garage also caught fire. There did not appear to be any injuries, but vehicles also were damaged from the flames.
The Oct. 11 blaze was on the second floor of the Fox Tower garage.
Firefighters were able to extinguish the fire in about 40 to 45 minutes, Mashantucket Pequot Fire Department Chief Floyd Chaney told The Day, a local newspaper.
Several levels of the garage were shut down until the fire was brought under control.
Investigators last week continued to search for the cause of the Foxwoods’ blaze.
Drivers in other vehicles were stuck in line in the garage while firefighters battled the flames. Smoke was billowing outside the garage, WTNH, a local TV station, reported.
Several local fire departments responded to the garage fire under a mutual aid agreement.
Foxwoods Resort Casino is owned and operated by the Mashantucket Pequot Tribal Nation. It is located in Ledyard, Conn. The casino is approximately 47 miles southeast of Hartford, Conn.
Robots Ready to Help at Choctaw
On another front, last week, it was reported that Oklahoma’s Choctaw Casino & Resort is the latest gaming property to automate some serving tasks in its restaurant.
Three robots will soon bring food and drinks to guests’ tables and return dirty dishes to the kitchen after a meal.
The high-tech robots use artificial intelligence (AI) and are equipped with multiple cameras.
Choctaw Casino further explained in a Facebook post the robots aren’t replacing staff but instead “helping them do their jobs better, faster, and more efficiently.” The robots can speak more than 80 languages and even sing “Happy Birthday” to guests celebrating at the casino.
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Source: casino.org