Powerball Frenzy Builds With Anticipation
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MIAMI (CBSMiami) - The day millions of Powerball players have been dreaming about is here.
The record setting jackpot for Wednesday night's drawing has grown to $1.5 billion. A single winner could take home a cash payout of $930-million.
"I have 100 dollars worth of Powerball lottery. I'm a tourist. I'm leaving today. So hopefully I'll get good news when I get home," said Gabriela Desouza bought tickets.
Wednesday night's drawing will be held in Tallahassee. Tickets can be bought up until 10 p.m.
At on point Tuesday night, nearly 370-thousand tickets were being sold every minute.
Wednesday morning at Miami International Airport, one of the busiest locations for Powerball ticket sales in Florida, tickets were flying out of the terminals.
"I'm going to make my friends in France jealous because you don't have that type of amount in France or in Canada as well," said Greg Arkhurst who is visiting from Canada.
Many tourists flying in or out of MIA made it a priority to stop by Mercado Miami to pick up tickets.
"If you don't play, you can't win," said Arkhurst who added that there's something about South Florida that makes him feel lucky.
Others feel luck from other sources.
"The other night we had Chinese food and I got the little thing (the fortune from inside a cookie) and it kept staying on my table so I said I'm not throwing this way, so it must be for reason so I'm going to try that too," said Eileen Ferrara.
Lottery officials said 85-percent of the possible number combinations have been purchased, leaving a 15-percent chance that there may not be a winner at all.
The odds of winning are nearly one in 292-million but that hasn't stopped the die hard player and once in a while player alike from plopping down cold hard cash for their chance to be the state's newest multi-millionaire.
"I'll tell you what, I never play, but what the heck," said Iveliss Muncy. "I mean you know, why not. Everybody has to have a chance."
"I think I'm going to be lucky, I'm going to hit the lottery," said Franklin Pierre.
The last time anyone won the Powerball was on November 4th, when the jackpot started all over again at just $40-million. Since then no one has matched all six numbers in the twice weekly game.
It's no accident the jackpot soared.
Back in October, Powerball changed the rules in an effort to boost ticket sales with a bigger payout.
Powerball started offering 69 numbers to choose from instead of 59. But that decreased the odds of winning the jackpot from one in 175 million to that one in 292 million.
Florida is one of the top Powerball ticket sellers across the country.
At 2 p.m., nearly 39,000 tickets each minute were sold Wednesday.
By 6 p.m., 48,000 tickets a minute were being sold and an hour later Florida was selling 53,000 each minute.
If there is no winner Wednesday night, the jackpot could be almost $2-billion for Saturday's drawing with a cash value of $1.24 billion.
Because of the high volume of ticket sales, lottery officials said it will take several hours after the drawing to sort through the numbers and determine if there's a winner or winners.
