Probably every person dreamed of winning the lottery. It's nice to get a gigantic amount of money without making the slightest effort. To many, this seems like something unrealizable - incredible luck that can only happen in the lives of others, but not in your own. However, some still managed to hit the "big jackpot", and there are many such people.
We present to you the ranking of the largest lottery wins in the world that have ever happened for the entire period of the early 2000s.
By the way, the most winning lotteries in the world with the largest jackpot PowerBall and Mega Millions, they are the most popular in the world in terms of the number of participants.
For obvious reasons, most of the winners wished to remain incognito.
10. Powerball lottery - $ 315 million, 2013
Money is not a guarantee of happiness and success, especially "easy" money. And this story is a vivid proof of that. On Christmas Eve, American Jack Whittaker made an incredible $ 315 million. But after that, his life and the life of his entire family went awry. It all started with the fact that Jack was robbed several times. But this is nothing compared to the fact that the corpse of a little boy who died from a drug overdose was found in his house. The winner was himself a cruel criminal. At the trial, his wife admitted that if it were not for this lottery, their life would have turned out differently.
9. Powerball lottery - $ 340 million, 2005
This story is not so much about the power of human intuition or intelligence, but about incredible luck. One day a simple American guy named Steve West decided to play a lottery called Powerball. The essence of the game was that the participants had to guess several numbers. West guessed everything. And he did this by choosing numbers at random, not relying on logic and not applying mathematical analysis. On the same day, millions of dollars were rained down on Steve.
8. Mega Millions lottery - $ 363 million, 2000
In this lottery, two won, but the story of one of them is so comical and so reminiscent of a scene from a movie that it is simply a crime to bypass it. One day one boy decided to have a snack at fast food, but he had no small money, and he had to give the cashier a large bill. The cashier had no change, and he offered him to buy 98 lottery tickets instead. The guy agreed. And that's how it turned out! On that day, the world famous Mega Millions jackpot hit the $ 363 million mark, which at that time was the largest prize in the entire lottery "world".
7. Powerball lottery - $ 365 million, 2006
The story of how important a healthy team atmosphere and mutual assistance are. In 2006, several workers at a meat processing plant in Nebraska decided to organize a so-called “pool,” a small syndicate. For fun, they bought some lottery tickets and ... became dollar millionaires! This lottery was called PowerBall, and in that drawing it raffled off $ 365 million.
6. Mega Millions lottery - $ 390 million, 2007
One of the most sensational lotteries of the previously mentioned Mega Millions.The announcement of the drawing of an unprecedented in its size cash super-prize caused a real stir throughout the country: people like crazy bought tickets in whole bundles, crowded in queues. Of course, there were more than enough people wishing to hit the jackpot, but on the night of March 7-8, only two winners were determined, who in good faith divided the winnings in half.
5. Powerball lottery - $ 425 million, 2014
California retiree Raymond Buxton decided to make a whole show out of his winnings. He decided not to receive his honestly won millions at once, but first to wait a month. Why a whole month? Buxton was simply waiting on April 1 to crash into the lottery headquarters on April Fools' Day wearing a Star Wars T-shirt that read "Jedi luck be with me!" Well, the Jedi's luck really was on the side of this gay old man. In an interview, he said that this win is the most incredible event in his entire life.
4. Powerball lottery - $ 587 million, 2012
This breathtaking win made several people from different cities happy at once. One lucky ticket was purchased in Ham Lake, Minnesota, and the other two, in New Jersey. If in Minnesota one person won - his name was Paul White, then in New Jersey there is a large group of friends of 16 people and another lucky one - Mario Skarnitsi. Taxes excluded, there were approximately $ 86 million per winner.
3. Powerball Lottery - $ 590 million, 2013
A unique case in the entire history of lottery winnings. The jackpot of nearly half a billion greens was won by Florida resident Gloria Mackenzie. It is noteworthy that this win was a single one - she did not have to share her money with anyone, which raised Gloria to the rank of champions. Just hyper luck!
2. Mega Millions lottery - $ 640 million, 2012
Another gift from the Mega Millions lottery. This staggering prize went to three lucky winners from three different cities in different states. The amount of 640 million dollars is very difficult to imagine in reality, for the average person it is something "cosmic". Each winner received $ 213 million, excluding tax.
1. Powerball Lottery - $ 1,586,400,000, 2016
More than one and a half billion dollars! Can you imagine this? After that, you start to believe in magic. This crazy jackpot was hit by three lucky ones from the states of California, Florida and Tennessee. The largest lottery win in the world for each individual was 528 million "green".
The largest lottery win in Russia - "Russian Lotto" RUB 506,000,000, 2017
Natalya Vlasova, a resident of the Voronezh region at the age of 63, became the owner of a record win in Russia, it amounted to 506 million rubles.
While reading the article, probably everyone thought about how the lives of these people have changed or about what they would do if they were in the shoes of these newly minted dollar millionaires and billionaires. In fact, none of this matters. As we can see, big money is not always the road to great happiness, sometimes even the opposite is true. The main thing is how you will manage this money.
We must never forget about other people: perhaps if Jack Whittaker gave at least part of his winnings to charity, he would be able to save himself from prison bars and his family from great misfortune.