It's not the power outage it's the fact that the stadium obviously has loser antique metal halide ballasts that can't ignite hot bulbs instead modern electronic ones that will instantly re-strike.
I heard a rumor that it had something to with one of the incoming feeders to the stadium.
This morning on CBS they were showing a video taken in the announcement room when the lights went out. One of the guys on a head set mic could be heard saying "We lost a feeder" "need to do a bus tie" and "20 minutes" could be made out in the audio.
They probably don't have feeder automation software either. And as for those Metal Halides it depends on how long the power was out to them. If it was really 20 minutes even instant-re strike models would need time to warm up.
After Katrina, you can book it that all the money the Fed gave them to spruce the place up after it had been used as a hotel by the locals was diverted to other things.
In a space like that the only appropriate means of powering the lights is through a UPS type system that can at least maintain output long enough to 1) transfer to an alternate utility source, and 2) when that fails allow enough time for the standby generation to start. It appears that there was emergency lighting, but compared to the venue revenue for a single event like the superbowl, how much could it possible cost to do it right?
Sounds like S&C Vista pad-mounted SF6 switchgear - unless something older. The standard relay is a proprietary S&C black box (actually made by SEL). It's pretty rudimentary as relays go. No oscillography - I don't think any event reports.
