A plan to demolish a derelict NFL stadium near Detroit has gone awry.

A series of blasts failed to topple the Pontiac Silverdome to the frustration of officials and the bemusement of a crowd gathered to watch the spectacle.

Fans of the Detroit Lions, the team that called the Silverdome home until moving to a downtown stadium after the 2001 season, joked on social media that the failed implosion was not the first time they found themselves leaving the stadium car park disappointed.

The Lions have not won a National Football League championship since 1957, the league’s second-longest title drought.

“Guess the Silverdome went through one too many implosions in its history,” the sports desk of the Detroit Free Press wrote on Twitter.

Live video footage of the planned demolition, which Pontiac city officials said was to make way for new development, was broadcast online on Sunday morning (local time) for nostalgic fans and those who enjoy watching large structures collapsing in smoke.

What they saw was plumes of smoke exploding out at regular intervals around the stadium’s perimeter with a smattering of loud bangs.

After the smoke wreathed upward and faded, the stadium was still standing proud, looking little different from what it has since its 1975 opening.

Demolition officials were quick to state the obvious.

“That didn’t work,” one official onsite said to two colleagues, the Detroit Free Press reported.