A forgotten Mega Millions ticket tucked into a sun visor turned into a $30,000 surprise for a Mount Airy man who nearly missed his big win.
The player purchased the ticket on a whim Oct. 2 at the 7-Eleven at 1610 Ridgeside Drive in Mount Airy. Although he had played Powerball and Mega Millions in the past, he usually bought tickets when jackpots climbed to especially high amounts.
Two weeks later, the Mega Millions jackpot is approaching that monster money threshold, with the annuity value of the jackpot for the Oct. 23 drawing at $433 million, with a one-time payment option of $178.6 million.
After making his purchase, he slipped the ticket into his sun visor and went about his day, he said Oct. 21 after claiming is prize at Lottery headquarters in Baltimore.
A few weeks later, while getting gas, the ticket fell from the visor onto his lap. Curious but not expecting much, he checked the numbers using the Maryland Lottery app.
He noticed that he matched four of the five numbers but wasn’t sure what that meant.
“Is it still a winner?” he recalled wondering.
He took the ticket back to the 7-Eleven where he purchased it, and the retailer confirmed the unexpected news: He had won $30,000.
“It if was 600 bucks, great,” he said, reflecting on how little he expected from the ticket.
The surprise was too big to keep to himself. When he got home, he shared the news with his roommate, who was just waking up from a nap.
“I got some news for you,” the winner told her.
“I sat up so fast,” his roommate recalled. “What?”
His roommate volunteered to drive him to Lottery headquarters because he prefers to avoid highways.
He plans to put the money aside for a rainy day, although he may treat his roommate to dinner to celebrate. As for his other companions, he is the proud pet parent of two dogs, a German shepherd and schnauzer mix, says they already get plenty of spoiling.
