What Caused Power Outage? Super Bowl Snafu Explained

As the big game is Monday morning quarterbacked, Americans are asking what caused the power outage last night and a subsequent 30-minute delay during Super Bowl 47.

What caused the power outage at 13:22 left in the third quarter of 2013’s Super Bowl was the question on everyone’s lips both last night and this morning — with Oreo famously making hay of the disruption with some social media gold on Twitter. Play was able to kick off again but not for the better part of an hour as the Superdome was plunged into darkness — along with screens across the US.

Spokesman for Entergy New Orleans Philip Allison said early on that what caused the power outage was initially not fully clear and said the issue was not on the company’s end. Allison explained:

“We don’t know a whole lot. It actually was not our issue. We were providing service as usual to the dome. We had power flowing to the dome. The issue was on the Superdome’s side.”

The NFL weighed in, as a spokesman noted:

“Stadium authorities are investigating the cause of the power outage. We will have more information as it becomes available.”

Jennifer Sabatelle, Vice President of Communications of CBS Sports weighed in, not explaining what caused the power outage but detailing how the network handled the problem:

“We utilized CBS’s back-up power and at no time did we leave the air … During the interruption, CBS Sports’ Steve Tasker, Solomon Wilcots and our studio team reported on the situation as a breaking news story, providing updates and reports while full power was being restored to the dome including our sets and broadcast booth. All commercial commitments during the broadcast are being honored.”

So, what did cause the power outage at last night’s Super Bowl? Entergy and Super Bowl management company SMG released a statement, explaining:

“A piece of equipment that is designed to monitor electrical load sensed an abnormality in the system … Once the issue was detected, the sensing equipment operated as designed and opened a breaker, causing power to be partially cut to the Superdome in order to isolate the issue … Entergy and SMG will continue to investigate the root cause of the abnormality.”

Beyonce’s halftime show has been widely speculated as a partial precipitate and perhaps what caused the power outage at the Super Bowl.