Store sells two winning lottery tickets

Both $1M matches in Saturday's Powerball drawing were sold at Olde Stone Truck Stop

By Alex Bridges -- abridges@nvdaily.com

CLEAR BROOK -- A Frederick County convenience store sold both of the $1 million winning Powerball lottery tickets in Saturday's drawing.

Virginia Lottery officials said Monday this likely marks a first for the Powerball game and they won't know until the buyers come forward to claim prizes whether one or more people bought the tickets.

Both winning tickets were bought at Olde Stone Truck Stop, 3425 Martinsburg Pike, according to lottery spokesman John Hagerty. Whoever bought the winning tickets has 180 days from the drawing date to claim the prizes. Lottery officials advise holders to sign the back of the tickets to establish ownership.

"We've never had two, $1 million winning tickets for the same drawing from the same store," Hagerty said after checking lottery records.

Each ticket matched the first five numbers in Saturday's Powerball drawing -- 5-13-17-20-30 and the Powerball number was 18. The odds of matching the five numbers is one in 5,153,633, according to Hagerty. Information on the odds of buying two winning lottery tickets from the same store for the same drawing was not available.

The spokesman noted it's not unusual for a store to sell winning tickets to other lottery games for the same drawing. In fact Olde Stone Truck Stop sold nine winning Pick 4 lottery tickets, each worth $5,000, for the same drawing in October, Hagerty said.

The tickets in Saturday's drawing mark the third and fourth time the Powerball has awarded $1 million to winners since the lottery changed the game beginning in January.

Winning tickets with five matching numbers had been worth $200,000.