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| A clerk prepares to operate a lottery machine to print out Mega Millions lottery tickets for a customer at Tobacco Plus Tuesday, Dec. 17, 2013, in Muncie, Ind. With tickets selling well, the jackpot for tonight's drawing is now at an estimated $636 million, the second-biggest lottery prize in U.S. history |
DES MOINES, Iowa
(AP) -- The Mega Millions jackpot has soared to an estimated $636
million for Tuesday night's drawing, making it the second largest
lottery jackpot in U.S. history.
The top prize
had been estimated at $586 million, but lottery officials increased
their prediction Tuesday morning because of strong ticket sales. The
jackpot now trails only a $656 million Mega Millions pot that was sold
in March 2012.
Mega Millions changed its rules
in October to help increase the jackpots by lowering the odds of
winning the top prize. That means the chances of winning the jackpot are
now about 1 in 259 million.
But that hasn't stopped aspiring multimillionaires from playing the game.
"Oh
I think there's absolutely no way I am going to win this lottery," said
Tanya Joosten, 39, an educator at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
who bought several tickets on Tuesday. "But it's hard for such a small
amount of money to not take the chance."
Annie Pedersen also said she wanted to be part of the action, so she jumped in and bought two tickets at a Milwaukee grocery.
"Everybody is so excited about it so I wanted to get in on some of the excitement, too, by watching," she said.
Tickets are selling at a pace that surpassed even the lottery's expectations.
"We
estimate by drawing time we'll be about $75 million ahead in sales,"
said Paula Otto, executive director of the Virginia Lottery and lead
director for Mega Millions.
Otto said
officials expect about 70 percent of the possible number combinations to
be purchased for Tuesday night's drawing. She also noted that if a
winner isn't selected either Tuesday night or for Friday's drawing, the
jackpot could hit $1 billion - an unheard of amount for Mega Millions or
Powerball, the nation's two main lottery games.
The drawing is scheduled for 11 p.m. EST. The cash option is estimated at $341 million, before taxes.
The
previous odds of winning Mega Millions' top prize were roughly 1 in 176
million, nearly the same as Powerball, which also has seen a surge in
large jackpots since its rules were revamped in January 2012.
Mega Millions is played in 43 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands.
