Super Bowl: The night the Superdome lights went out in New Orleans
2025-01-31
Category: sports

The Superdome in New Orleans was rocking after the Baltimore Ravens had just scored the longest touchdown in Super Bowl history.But just moments after Jacoby Jones had lit up Super Bowl 47, the lights went out.And those 34 extraordinary minutes of darkness are largely what the last Super Bowl held in New Orleans on 3 February 2013 is known for.    Not John and Jim Harbaugh making history as brothers and head coaches contesting the Super Bowl, not the final game of NFL legend Ray Lewis and not the emergence of San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick.Not even Beyonce and a Destiny's Child reunion during the half-time show could pinch the lead headline away from the night the lights went out at the Super Bowl.On 9 February, the big game returns to the Big Easy for the first time since, as the Kansas City Chiefs aim to become the first team to win it three times in a row against the 49ers. All steps have been taken to ensure there's no repeat of the incident - which almost changed the outcome of America's biggest sporting spectacle.
What happened when the lights went out?
"Is it getting a little warm in here?" asked a fellow journalist sat next to me perched high up in the rafters in the press box at the Superdome.In hindsight now we know why, but at the time we were trying to make sense of the choas on the pitch after the Ravens had just taken a commanding lead.The Superdome is loud, seriously loud. Even with the crowd split between the two teams, the roars and cheers were still reverberating from below, ricocheting off the roof and hammering our ear drums.Then it happened. Our monitors went off, the scoreboard disappeared, the stadium announcer's booming voice was silenced and the majority of the stadium's lights went out.Apart from some emergency lighting, darkness engulfed the Superdome. And silence. Such an eerie experience in such a huge building.A riotous cauldron of noise was turned into a shadowy cavern of worried murmurings and disbelief - with nobody having a clue what was happening.Players searched for their families in the stands, some stretched and some just sat down, bemused, as NFL officials ran about looking to find what the problem was, and the solution.There was precious little communication, as we tried to call, email, get in contact with someone, somewhere, with some knowledge of the situation.Once the spectre of something more threatening was ruled out, a power outage was given as the reason, and after the most famous half an hour of darkness in American sports history, we were ready to get back under way.The silence heard around the world was broken, the blackout watched by hundreds of millions was over - but the story was very much not.
How the blackout almost changed the Super Bowl
When the lights came back on, it was like the two sides had switched shirts, as a Baltimore team that had dominated to lead 28-6 had lost all their momentum.Jones' incredible 108-yard touchdown to start the second half was long forgotten, and Kaepernick engineered a run of 17 points scored in just over four minutes.Even after a late Ravens field goal, the 49ers had one last chance to score and win the game, before a discombobulated Ravens defence finally stopped them to win 34-31.A one-sided beatdown had become a nail-biting thriller, but plenty of Ravens were not happy with lots of conspiracy theories about whether somebody had actually pulled the plug."I'm not gonna accuse nobody of nothing - because I don't know facts," said a chuckling Lewis in the NFL's America's Game series released shortly after the incident."But you're a zillion-dollar company, and your lights go out? No. No way."The blackout undoubtedly changed the game - it took the wind out of Baltimore's sails and gave San Francisco time to regroup - but it ultimately did not change the outcome.Now if the 49ers had completed their comeback and lifted the Lombardi Trophy instead of Lewis and his Ravens, that would be a different story.
Superdome ready to put things right
An investigation traced the problem to a relay device - ironically something to protect the stadium from power problems - and something not even inside the Superdome.Usually a more regular Super Bowl host city, New Orleans has had to wait 12 years to put the 'Blackout Bowl' right - and the host committee and local power company are taking no chances.Entergy has replaced all of the systems used 12 years ago and the Superdome has had a sizeable makeover, including new LED lights that take far less time to switch back on.A reason for the blackout lasting 34 minutes was the reboot time of the old lighting system."We're very confident in terms of the three feeds we have there," Entergy's Shelton Hudson told media, external before Super Bowl week.All systems have been given thorough checks during big Superdome events such as concerts by Beyonce and, ironically enough, the world's biggest Kansas City Chiefs fan, Taylor Swift.The Super Bowl is another level though, and the Superdome will be under scrutiny to make sure there are no problems this time around.Twelve years is a long time to change a few lightbulbs, and with the world watching again, the Superdome and NFL officials will be keeping their fingers crossed.Hopefully the NFL's leading lights on the field will be making all the headlines this time around.