Super Bowl Outage

During the excitement and rush of 3rd quarter, the escalators and credit card machines spontaneously shut down, the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans had a power surge, resulting in a loss of power in the Superdome. At least half, if not more, of the lights shut off after Beyonce's electrifying half-time performance. Her show was almost epileptic to those who don't even have epilepsy, and the over-usage of lights made many believe it caused a power surge (dang it Beyonce, this is why we can't have nice things) resulting in a power outage. The outage lasted for a total of 34 minutes before the maintenance room switched back on the power in the 3rd quarter. The 73,000-seat dome went out with 13:22 remaining in the third quarter on Sunday night. 

According to a report by Sports Illustrated, the outage was due to an "abnormality" in the power supply system that set off an automatic shutdown, which forced backup systems to start up." To go more into detail, the power company, SMG and Entergy New Orleans, power supplier to the Super Bowl, released a statement saying "A piece of equipment that is designed to monitor electrical load sensed an abnormality in the system," the statement said. "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. "

The worst part for New Orleans is that the outage may have affected their chances for holding future Super Bowls at the Superdome. New Orleans was looking forward to hosting its first Super Bowl since 2002 and was eager to show off how the city has rebuilt since Hurricane Katrina.

However, just like any other unexpected event, people responded with conspiracies. Possible theories include:

•       The 49'ers cut the power when they were getting trampled in the first half.
•       49'ers coach Jim Harbaugh cut the power when losing.
•       Beyonce's performance caused a power surge.
•       A booker who bet in Las Vegas was at the Superdome and cut the power when he realized  he wasn't going to win his bet.
•       Terrorism (obviously ruled out by the FBI).

Still many fans didn't care, yet a few fans were scared. "I started thinking it was a terrorist attack. I was a little nervous!" said Doug Cook, a Ravens fan. The football fans in the dome passed the time by refilling their beers, doing the waves, and being humorous. Pictures and tweets bombarded Twitter including some tweets saying "They didn't pay the light bill," or "Maybe this is Sean Payton calling in for the outage, Bountygate, part two."

After 34 minutes, the power returned, and with it, so did the 49'ers encouragement. Scoring 2 touchdowns in 2 minutes and almost going for a 3rd, many people were stunned, and many 49'ers fans betting with their Ravens friends became happy. While screams heard 'round Baltimore continued with a few minutes left, Kaepernick decided to throw the ball three times instead of rushing. Kaepernick, with an average rushing yardage of 8 yards, didn't rush when there were 5 more yards to go, and alas, no touchdown, giving the Ravens the win, 34-31.