NFL commissioner Roger Goodell said Sunday’s 34-minute blackout won’t impact the city of New Orleans’ chances of hosting another Super Bowl.
“I fully expect that we will be back here for Super Bowls,” he said Monday morning. “And I hope we will be back. We want to be back.”
The outage was blamed on an unspecified “abnormality” in the Superdome’s power system.
Goodell said there was another alternative if the blackout had continued. According to Goodell, there was a backup system that was ready to get rebooted when the lights were restored.
“This is clearly something that can be fixed, and it’s clearly something that we can prepare for,” he said. “And we will.”
Larry Roedel, a lawyer for the state board that oversees the Superdome, said Monday that the outage did not appear to be related to work done on the stadium’s electrical system in December. The work, approved by the Louisiana Stadium and Exposition District last fall, replaced feeder equipment connecting the stadium to power provider Entergy New Orleans.
Doug Thornton, manager of the Superdome, said that when the power outage hit, meters indicated the stadium was drawing less power than it does during a typical New Orleans Saints game.
Thornton said millions of dollars have been spent upgrading electrical equipment in the building since Hurricane Katrina hit in 2005, and none of it failed. He said it was working properly when power was restored.
He also said there is no evidence that the halftime show had anything to do with the outage, which struck early in the third quarter. He said the show used its own dedicated generator and wasn’t using the Superdome’s power supply.
This was New Orleans’ first Super Bowl since 2002, and the city was eager to show off how it has been rebuilt since Hurricane Katrina.
“We knew they have an interest in future Super Bowls, and we look forward to evaluating that,” Goodell said. “Going forward, I don’t think this will have any impact at all on what I think will be remembered for one of the greatest Super Bowl weeks.”
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