Someone is a whole lot richer after the winning Powerball ticket for nearly $700 million was sold on the Central Coast.
The winning ticket in Monday night’s drawing was sold at the Albertsons on Quintana Road in Morro Bay.
After nearly four months and 40 draws without a grand prize winner, a ticket at the grocery store hit all six numbers.
“When I heard it was a grocery store, then I heard it was Albertsons, I go, ‘What? Albertsons? Somebody won there? Oh my God!’” said local Alice Lenoir.
“I think it's really cool,” said Jack Mettier of Cambria. “I had just heard about it when I came into the parking lot and I went, ‘Wow! Somebody's pretty lucky.’”
“I didn't know about it until a grade school chum in Texas emailed me this morning to say, ‘Was it you?’” said Rosemary Donnell of Morro Bay.
The winning ticket was for a whopping $699.8 million.
It’s left some envious of the mystery winner.
“I was thinking that I go to that grocery store all the time,” said Madisyn Harless of Morro Bay.
If the winner chooses the lump sum, they’ll be $496 million richer minus federal taxes.
The winner also has the option to take 30 graduated payments over 29 years.
“Congratulations to the people who won,” said Morro Bay visitor Fran Antenore. “We hope that it changes their lives in very positive ways.”
“Winning that much money would be a curse, not a blessing,” Donnell added.
Others can’t help to think about what they would do with the cash.
“I think I would probably finish paying off the house and the car and getting my kids set up for the future,” said Mettier.
“Finally take a vacation,” said Harless.
We may not know who the winner is for a while because they have one year from the drawing date to claim the prize.
“Here at the California Lottery, we have a really rigorous vetting process to make sure winners are who they say they are, so it can take any number of weeks to verify a winner,” said Carolyn Becker, spokesperson for the California State Lottery.
It’s the 5th largest Powerball jackpot and the 7th largest jackpot in overall lottery history.
“I did spend a few dollars on Powerball the last couple of weeks and went in with a group of guys and that but nothing ever panned out,” said Leroy Tomcak who is visiting Morro Bay.
The chances of hitting all six numbers in Monday night’s jackpot was 1 in 292,201,338.
“I'm just curious to know, who, who was it? Who was the person that won?” Lenoir said.
While we still do not know who won the Powerball jackpot, we know that Albertsons will receive $1 million for selling the winning ticket and public schools in California will receive more than $78 million.
Powerball started doing Monday draws on August 23 and this is the first jackpot won on the newest draw day.
