Can Comcast detect service interruptions?

Does Comcast have a system in place to recognize outages in an area, or does it rely solely on customer reports? We lost power during a storm last night at around 9 PM. I awoke at 3:30 AM to restored power and a blinking DS light on my modem. I should have reported the outage then, but I figured Comcast would have it fixed by morning. When I woke again at 6:30 AM there was still no connection, so I started troubleshooting (power cycle, reset, modem refresh option from support menu) all to no avail. Using my alternate Internet connection, I logged into my account where the service status icons showed no problems in my area. Assuming my modem was the issue, I called support at around 7:30 AM, and the technician reported no problems either and scheduled a service call. I stayed on the line to handle another issue, and after about 15 minutes (and two transfers) the rep on the line mentioned that there was an outage in my area that was posted to their system at about 7:35 AM, after I first called.

How is it possible that an outage would be undetected for more than 10 hours? Isn't there a monitoring system in place that would show massive disconnections in an area? If the service status indicators on the web site had been promptly updated, I wouldn't have wasted time troubleshooting my own connection. I'm curious, because it appears that Comcast waits for reports from its customers instead of proactively monitoring and fixing issues as they arise.