Mega Millions: South Carolina ticket claims record jackpot, million-dollar winners in Delco, South Jersey
The final jackpot prize — $1..537 billion — fell just short of a world record.
One ticket sold in South Carolina won Tuesday night's record-breaking $1.537 billion Mega Millions jackpot, with tickets sold in Delaware County and South Jersey winning second-tier prizes, lottery officials said.
The winning numbers are: 5, 28, 62, 65, and 70, plus the Mega Ball 5.
Frenzied sales produced 36 second-place tickets worth $1 million each — including two in New Jersey and one in Pennsylvania — and one in Texas worth $3 million because it had the Megaplier option. Those tickets had the first five numbers but not the Mega Ball.
Mega Millions in the meantime reported that the grand prize had fallen short of the estimated payout of $1.6 billion — which would have been a world lottery record — after final sales reports came in. The lottery said the final prize was $1.537 billion, a record for Mega Millions but just short of the the $1.58 billion world-record jackpot set by Powerball in the Jan. 13, 2016, drawing. But that prize was split three ways while there was only one winning ticket in Tuesday's Mega Millions game, setting a world record for a single ticket.
The lump sum payment also was scaled down to $878 million, from the estimated $913.7 million.
The Mega Millions jackpot had been increasing since July 24, when a California office pool of 11 co-workers shared a $543 million prize. Three other jackpots have been won this year – $451 million on Jan. 5 in Florida, $533 million on March 30 in New Jersey, and $142 million on May 4 in Ohio.
The odds of winning the jackpot are 1 in 302.5 million.
Second-place tickets also were sold in California (eight); Florida and New York (four each); Massachusetts, Michigan, North Carolina, and Virginia (two each); and one each in Arizona, the District of Columbia, Iowa, Kentucky, Missouri, New Mexico, Ohio, Texas, and Wisconsin.
Didn't win one of the top prizes? Don't throw your tickets away yet. There are seven other ways to collect in the Mega Millions lottery.
The jackpot in Wednesday's Powerball drawing is an estimated $620 million, $354.3 million in cash. The odds of winning that prize are 1 in 292.2 million.