A couple from the West Coast say they celebrated with a few chocolate biscuits after claiming the final third of a huge $15 million Lotto Powerball prize.
The $15 million Powerball jackpot drawn on February 14 was split three ways, with lucky players who purchased tickets from Coastlands Lotto in Paraparaumu, New World Greymouth and MyLotto pocketing $5.08 million each.
Two portions of the prize had already been claimed, one by a Masterton man who ran through his house in his underwear and another by a grandfather who always buys his ticket after a walk in Paraparaumu on the Kapiti Coast.
The West Coast pair, who wished to remain anonymous, had no idea a major prize was still unclaimed in their area until the man's sister mentioned it in passing.
The man joked: "Nah, no need – it was us, we won it,' and that was before we even knew!"
The comment was quickly forgotten until a few days later, when he decided to pop into New World Greymouth and check his ticket.
"The look on the operator’s face will stay with me forever," he said.
"She calmly closed the Lotto counter and took me to the office where she said 'you've just won Lotto,' and showed me the receipt with the amount on it.
"I started shaking, trying to make sense of it – I just couldn’t comprehend the numbers," he said.
Through tears, he called his partner and told her they had just become multi-millionaires.
Later that night, the couple marked the moment with a couple of chocolate biscuits in lieu of champagne.
The couple were still processing the news, and have been busy thinking about their future and all of the opportunities ahead.
"We're so overwhelmed and emotional. We just keep saying to each other 'can you believe it?'"
"Our wish list isn’t that long," said the man. "We'll pay off our mortgage and do some renovations, and we'd love to take a trip in the future."
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