Two separate power outages forced 38 minutes worth of delays in the second period of the game between the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Penguins at Mellon Arena last night, and a minor fire broke out in an electrical relay box inside the building but posed no safety issues.

The first interruption, which occurred at 8:49 p.m. and resulted in a delay of 18 minutes, was blamed on a malfunction with the Duquesne Light Co. power line coming into the building, according to Ken Sawyer, the Penguins' president.

The arena has a backup generator for such situations and play was able to resume. But a second interruption at 9:11 p.m. led to a 20-minute delay as both teams went to their locker rooms.

The smell from the fire in the relay box behind Section B 27 could be detected in the press box, but it was quickly extinguished.

"It was never a safety issue," Sawyer said.

Play had resumed for only four minutes when the second outage occurred. Officials decided to take the second intermission and play a third period of 27 minutes.

"It's not the first time we've had this problem with Duquesne Light," Sawyer said. "I don't know if it's the supply coming into the building or a problem with the building itself. I want to find out what's the problem."

Some in the crowd of 15,174 chanted "new arena" during the stoppages, and Sawyer also made a quip about the building, which is the oldest and smallest in the NHL and which the Penguins want to replace.

"My first thoughts were we need a new arena," Sawyer said wryly at an impromptu news conference.

In both stoppages, the inside of the building went dark for only a split second. But the problems were complicated by the fact that the arena's metal halide lights require 15 minutes to be reset even if there is the slightest interruption in power.

"We started again -- we have an alternate source of power -- but then Duquesne Light flipped the switch for whatever reason a second time, and that blew the first source, and that's what caused the problem. At the same time, probably a surge here caused a little fire in an electrical panel. That's been entirely taken care of," Sawyer said.

When the lights flickered and play stopped, Toronto was on a five-minute power play because Penguins defenseman Eric Cairns was called for boarding and given a game misconduct. During the delay, players from both benches skated around the ice to stay loose, and scoreboard TV showed a video of the Isle of Capris proposal for a new arena tied to a gambling license.

"I had no thoughts of canceling the game once I heard the explanation," Sawyer said.