Update: Winning numbers - 2 11 26 34 41 (32)
The Powerball just keeps on rolling as its jackpot prize hits $360 million--the third highest in the history of the lottery game.
Since no one won the multimillion dollar prize of $270 million during Saturday's drawing, the prize has zoomed its way to $350 million. However, on Tuesday, May 14, Powerball officials announced that the pot for Wednesday's drawing had increased by $10 million. It now sits at a whopping $360 million.
The decision, the officials say, was due to strong lottery ticket sales the past days.
So far, the pot has increased 7-times since March 30's jackpot prize of $50 million. Wednesday night's draw will also mark the 12th draw since Illinois-native, Pedro Quezada, won the grand prize. According to the Huffington Post, Quezada was a former bodega owner before bringing home $338 million from the lotto.
The current jackpot will award the ticket holder with all six numbers including the Powerball number over $229 million in cash value or $360 million in annuities.
According to Powerball, the odds of matching all the right numbers are 1 in 175,223,510. Notably though, a 2012 redesign of the game allowed tickets that match certain amount of numbers to win cash as well. This increases the chances of a better winning. Tickets can win somewhere between $4 to $1 million, depending on the number matchings.
Last Saturday's draw had over 12 tickets winning $1 million in 10 different states, reported ABC News.
Iowa Lottery spokeswoman, Mary Neubauer, also noted how bigger jackpots have been growing over the past years. She says the cross-selling of Powerball and Mega Millions tickets have been helping the robust sales.
"It usually took a handful of months, if not several months, for a jackpot to reach this large amount," Neubauer told ABC News. "Now it's achieving that within a handful of weeks. I think the redesign is achieving exactly what we had wanted it to achieve, which is the bigger, faster-growing jackpot."
According to the New York Daily News, if the jackpot prize is not won by Wednesday, May 18's pot could reach a record high of $587.5 million.
May 15, Thursday's Powerball draw will happen at 10:50 pm ET. Live online streaming will be provided at powerballlive.com/powerball/, with the winning numbers posted on powerball.com.
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