Life is a different gamble in the Las Vegas underworld

UNDERNEATH its glitzy casinos, far from the bright marquees, there is another Las Vegas, a pitch-black, dank underworld virtually unknown and unseen by those who live, work and play above.

About 300 people – mostly men battling demons of various addictions – live in the underground storm system built to protect the desert playground from the infrequent cloudburst.

There is no sign or word of welcome down here. Drug use is nearly universal. Most people carry makeshift weapons and the police do not often come unless they are called.

But the denizens have found a haven in the labyrinth of concrete tunnels that snake beneath the city and its suburbs.

In a place where total darkness can be one bend away, visitors to this urban netherworld stumble across the unexplainable. A beat-up teddy bear lies next to a dirty chef's knife propped up against a wall. Graffiti turns into murals near sparse pockets of light.

A scruffy black cat's meow is startling as it scrambles in a pile of rubbish to escape a flashlight's beam. The echoes of footsteps change as boots hit standing water, or accidentally kick empty beer bottles as they tiptoe past midday sleepers. Fetid smells of rubbish, dirty water and wet cloth waft through the corridors.

Each subterranean encampment can be as spartan as a few worn blankets, or as elaborate as an apartment fitted with queen-size beds, dining utensils and ornaments.

"You'd be surprised the things that wash down in this channel … it's hard to even describe," said Rick "Iron" Cobble, a 45-year-old Oklahoma native, who sleeps in a 5ft-high tunnel near the south end of the glittering Strip, not far from the "Welcome to Fabulous Las Vegas" sign.

Mr Cobble said his only belongings are a small pile of blankets and his clothes. "Right now I'm just trying to survive," he said.

Rich Penksa, a retired correctional sergeant who began visiting the tunnels last year for a homeless outreach project, said he first heard about the them years ago from prison inmates.

"I don't think I've ever felt odder than when I'm down in that tunnel environment," said Mr Penksa, who once encountered thousands of spiders feasting on the baby mosquitoes multiplying in standing water. Mr Penksa frequents the tunnels for Help of Southern Nevada, which is working to place tunnel residents into more conventional homes.

The people who call these tunnels home – mostly men aged 35 to 50 – are a distinct breed, Mr Penksa said. "Even the folks that are homeless above ground are very leery of the inhabitants of the tunnels. They're kind of feared."

"Down here, we're out of sight, out of mind," said Eric D, 40, a New Yorker, who has spent the past five years sleeping between four tunnels near various casinos. "Which is cool with me because that's the way I prefer it."