New Zealand lottery retailer keeps secret town’s biggest ever NZ Powerball win

NEW ZEALAND LOTTERY RETAILER KEEPS SECRET TOWN’S BIGGEST EVER NZ POWERBALL WIN

A lottery retailer in Timaru, New Zealand, has finally been able to reveal that one of the town’s residents has won the largest NZ Powerball prize in lottery history.The supermarket manager told NZ Powerball officials that keeping one of the town’s biggest secrets was hard, but that they were delighted for the local couple that claimed their prize a week before Christmas. The lottery revealed on Tuesday December 19th that a $7.25 million Powerball win from Saturday night had been claimed by the Timaru couple, who chose to remain anonymous, at the Countdown store on Church Street, the same store where they bought the ticket. Recently a lottery player from Tauranga in New Zealand credited a lucky feeling with his $10.3 million NZ Powerball win, while a woman from West Auckland asked her lottery retailer for the “luckiest ticket they had”, and won $3.8 million on the NZ Powerball.The store manager, Debbie Pawson, told lottery officials that despite the couple claiming their prize in the store on the Sunday, the day after the drawing, she had been sworn to secrecy until Lotto New Zealand officially validated the NZ Powerball win. “All I can say now is they are local,” she said, adding: “We are really happy for them and we know it’s going to make their Christmas amazing for quite a while.” A EuroMillions winner from Dublin in Ireland also kept her win a big secret after claiming €500,000.The winning Powerball couple, who released a statement through Lotto New Zealand, said that after realising they had the winning lottery ticket they’d hardly slept since. The wife told lottery officials that her husband was checking the ticket as the Lotto draw took place on TV, and the pair of them were incredulous when they realised they’d matched all the numbers.“We called our kids into the room and we were all checking and double-checking the ticket to make sure we had it right,” she told NZ Powerball officials, adding that it took a while for them to find out how much they’d won.Just like a Michigan Powerball winner of $1 million who said he couldn’t stop jumping for joy, the couple said: “we were hugging each other and jumping around the lounge, there were even a few tears,” the statement says. “We’ve been talking about a new car, or maybe a new house – but it’s really the things that money can’t buy we’re most excited about, like time with family.” A recent Australian Gold Lotto winner also said that he was looking forward to spending more time with family after winning $1 million.Grab a chance to become a lottery winner and purchase your tickets online at Lottery24.com.