GREENSBORO, N.C. — Almost 10 hours after the Powerball drawing was supposed to happen, we got these winning numbers and while the jackpot went to a player in California, 300,000+ North Carolinians won some amount of money in this delayed drawing.
According to the NC Education Lottery, North Carolina winners will collect one $1 million prize, a $100,000 prize, and eight $50,000 prizes from the drawing. In all, 343,323 tickets sold in our state won prizes in the drawing. Since Aug. 6 when the jackpot started at $20 million, North Carolinians have won a total of three $1 million prizes, seven $150,000 prizes, six $100,000 prizes, and 39 $50,000 prizes.
- $1 million ticket: Sold in Wilmington
- $100,000 ticket: Sold in Rocky Mount
- Eight $50,000 tickets: Sold in Charlotte, Gatesville, Winston-Salem, Statesville, Belmont, Fayetteville, Morehead City, and Franklin
WHAT CAUSED THE POWERBALL DRAWING DELAY?
It's probably not surprising to you that you didn't win the jackpot, but I bet the delay was a shock.
“It's unfortunate that it happened since the jackpot was 1.9 Billion, but the most important thing is that the drawing is done with integrity. We want to hold our drawings on time, but we also want to make sure they go exactly like they're supposed to,” said Van Denton, NC Education Lottery.
The way they're supposed to go is that the Powerball numbers
can only be drawn if the Gaming System numbers and the Internal Control System numbers match up for every lottery system, and there are 48 of them.
THE PROCESS: NC EXAMPLE
To give you an example of how it works in North Carolina, every time a ticket is bought at one of the 7,000 retail locations, it sends ticket sales data to the North Carolina Lottery gaming system.
At the same time, the Internal Control System is keeping track of sales and audits the Gaming System in real-time. It works like this in all 48 lottery states, until it doesn't.
“It's not until after the close of sales on the drawing night that we make sure they're in balance. Last night ours did, they did in 47 places, but one state didn’t, so everything stopped,” said Denton.
Why didn't it work? Short answer, a computer glitch. It’s not the first time. It happened last month, but it only delayed the drawing by an hour.
Think about this, there are 156 drawings a year and delays are rare.