Last week, the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation has informed of another amazing Lotto 6/49 prize win in the province. According to the Crown, three winners with two winning tickets will share a CA$5,000,000 jackpot from New Year’s Eve. The winners are from two different Ontario cities and the two tickets will each claim a hefty CA$2,500,000.
Lotto 6/49 is a nationwide draw-based game which is drawn twice per week in Canada. Since mid-September 2022, the offering boasts a new format, and now there are two big jackpots with each round. First is the Classic or guaranteed one of CA$5,000,000 and then there is the Gold Ball jackpot that can reach the whooping CA$60,000,000.
The Two Winning Tickets
The first winning ticket belongs to Debra and Kenneth Skitch from Bowmanville and they have been playing the lottery for over 40 years. The married couple opts for birthdays and birth months when it comes to selecting their lucky numbers, and now these numbers have brought them half of a CA$5 million jackpot from a New Year’s Eve draw.
Last week, the married couple arrived at OLG Prize Centre in downtown Toronto to claim their prize. They shared that on New Year’s Day, they checked their tickets only to see that they have won a Guaranteed jackpot. Mr. Kenneth said heard the winning jingle and first thought they have obtained a free ticket. The pair said they are feeling on cloud nine from the windfall.
However, the December 31, 2022 jackpot brought joy to another household in Ontario, as the 54-year-old Shane King will claim the other half of the CA$5 million jackpot. The New Tecumseh’s local revealed that he has been playing the lotto for over 10 years, and shared that his emotion really took over once he realized that he is the winner of a hefty CA$2.5 million.
With the prize money, Mr. King said that he will take some time to sleep on it and speak with a financial advisor. Meanwhile, the Skitchs will invest the money into retirement. The two winning tickets for the draw were purchased at Daisy on King Street in Bowmanville, and Cookstown Mart on Queen Street in Cookstown, respectively.
Canadians Claim Gold Ball Jackpots
After the introduction of the new and improved Lotto 6/49 variant in mid-September 2022, it took just over a month for someone to claim it. Even after winning it a few months ago, the winner of the first-ever Gold Ball Jackpot Jean-Marc Poirier came forward last week to claim it. The Quebecer has won an impressive CA$36 million to his name.
Another major and intriguing lottery win in the new version came from Sault Ste. Marie, where a first-time ticket buyer won the stunning CA$48 million. The winner of the mega prize was 18-year-old Juliette Lamour who listened to her grandfather’s advice to buy a ticket for the January 7, 2023 draw. She is now the youngest person in Canadian history to win a prize of this magnitude.
Source: Arsenych, Alex “Three lottery winners from 2 Ontario cities split huge Lotto 6/49 jackpot” CTV News Toronto, February 17, 2023
