Lottery News

This Iowan Lottery player drove around with a winning Powerball ticket worth $50,000 in his car for almost a year! This Holiday Season was filled with ups and downs for Casey Langan, 49, after discovering that he was possessing a winning Powerball ticket after losing his job.

He was let go from the company as part of a layoff, but that unfortunate event led him to quite a pleasant surprise. While he was cleaning out his work vehicle, he found a Powerball ticket, about which he had completely forgotten about.

Next, he just checked the numbers online and could not believe his eyes. Four out of five numbers matched the white ball numbers drawn on January 18 Powerball drawing, almost a year ago. If he had matched one more number, he would have walked away with that night’s astounding jackpot worth $343 million. The winning numbers for that drawing were 20, 24, 38, 56, and 68 with Powerball number 18 and Power Play number 2.

Just to be sure of his win-win situation, he took the ticket to a local convenience store to get it checked at the lottery terminal.

And when the terminal scanned the ticket it chimed "Woohoo! You're a winner!" Langan shared his astonishing experience with the lottery officials when he claimed his prize at Iowa Lottery headquarters in Clive on Wednesday.

A press release said that it couldn’t be better timing for the lottery winner to bag such a great amount, looking back at his circumstances. He recalls the time when he bought the ticket as a Quick Pick at the Kwik Star convenience store on West Ninth Street in Waterloo.

The lucky lottery winner had just five weeks left to claim the winnings before it would have expired. The winning Powerball tickets in Iowa must be claimed within a period of 365 days from the date of the drawing.

The lucky winner hopes that the luck coming across his ticket will help in his job search. He also urged the other players to check their tickets as soon as possible.