NFL 'Convinced' Lights Will Stay On At MetLife Stadium For Super Bowl XLVIII
EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. (CBSNewYork/AP) - The NFL huddled with PSE&G Thursday on the plan to supply electricity to MetLife Stadium for Super Bowl XLVIII in February.
As WCBS 880's Peter Haskell reported, there were no guarantees, but the utility is confident the lights will stay on for the big game.
"We've taken every precaution and every lesson learned that we could from prior Super Bowls," PSE&G president Ralph LaRossa said. "We now have three lines that are coming into that transformer for redundancy."
NFL 'Convinced' Lights Will Stay On At MetLife Stadium For Super Bowl XLVIII
Any one line could handle the job, Haskell reported.
LaRossa said the Super Bowl site will require about 18 megawatts of electricity, or about what it takes to power 12,000 homes.
At Super Bowl XLVII at the Superdome in New Orleans, there was a 34-minute blackout at the start of the second half.
The outage was blamed on an electrical relay device installed specifically to prevent a power failure.
Officials are intent on making sure there's not a repeat performance this season.
"Roughly 35 minutes after the lights went out, we began to consider ways to avoid the possibility of a recurrence right here," Frank Supovitz of the NFL said. "We are convinced we have taken every measure required."
He added redundancies have been put in place and gameday stress has been simulated to ensure the power supply will last for the duration of the game and the halftime show.
"That test went very, very well," Supovitz said.
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