$5.5 Million Powerball Winner Comes Forward

A Lotto-winning couple from New Zealand came forward recently, after waiting nearly a week to claim their NZ$5.5 million jackpot. The couple were the third ticket holders in two weeks to lay claim to the Powerball jackpot, after winning the NZ Lotto first division prize and matching the Powerball number on Wednesday, May 1st.

The winning NZ Lotto numbers for the May 1st draw were 7, 16, 17, 32, 37 and 38. The Powerball number was 2.

The winning ticket, bought from Tiapa Foodmarket in Northland, was the only one to match all six main numbers and the Powerball number, granting the ticket holders the entirety of the NZ$5 million Powerball jackpot. They were one of two ticket-holders to match all six main numbers; they share the $1 million jackpot with a North Island player, who bought their ticket from Paper Plus in Taupo.

The winners spoke about the moment they discovered their win over a breakfast cup of tea. "The first thing I saw [on the news] was 'Taipa Foodmarket sells $5.5 million Powerball prize', so when my husband returned [to bed] I mentioned it to see whether that's where he'd picked up our ticket that week."

On checking their ticket against the numbers, they soon learnt they were the jackpot winners. “When I read out the Powerball number, he looked at me and said ‘it’s us – we’ve bloody won it!” Their morning brew was soon swapped for bubbly, and the ticket hidden away for safekeeping – in the underwear drawer. “Let’s be honest, no one is going to go poking around in there,” said one of the winners.

Their plans so far are to give back to their local community through supporting local businesses, as well as sharing their winnings with their children.

Third Powerball Jackpot Win in Two Weeks

The Powerball jackpot win was the third in two weeks, after the draws on April 17th and April 24th also had First Division winners. Incredibly, both draws were won by players from Auckland; on April 17th, an online player won a $16.2 million jackpot, after sharing the NZ Lotto jackpot of $1 million with three other players, and winning the Powerball jackpot too. The following week, another Auckland-based online player won NZ$5.3 million.

May 1st marks the eighth Powerball jackpot win in 2019. The largest Powerball win so far this year came on January 2nd, with a Lotto and Powerball ticket worth $22.3 million sold at Inglewood Bookcentre in the Taranaki region. Four of the supplementary jackpots so far in 2019 were won on NZ Lotto's online service MyLotto.

How Does Powerball Work?

Powerball is a supplementary game, played alongside NZ Lotto. After the six main numbers are drawn for NZ Lotto, a seventh number - the Powerball - is drawn from a separate pool consisting of the numbers 1 to 10. Opting in to Powerball costs an extra NZ$0.70 per line, but gives you the chance to increase your lottery win by up to NZ$50 million.

There are seven prize tiers, or divisions, available in Powerball; in order to win a prize, you must match at least three main numbers and the Powerball. To win the Powerball jackpot, you must match all six main Lotto numbers and the Powerball.

NZ Lotto and Powerball are played twice a week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays.