Mega Millions Numbers Come Up Empty As Ticket Sales Drop Again


The Mega Millions numbers drawn Tuesday night, for the second drawing in a row, produced no jackpot winner and also, no winners of the “Match 5” million dollar second prize. There were only 18 winners of the $5,000 third prize — the exact same number as for last Friday’s drawing — as well.

But the absence of big winners at the top end of the Mega Millions prize spectrum is not too surprising. Ticket sales for the nationwide lottery game have been limping, and the fewer tickets purchased, the lower the chance that any one ticket will beat the overwhelming odds and claim one of the game’s top prizes.

The chances of hitting the Mega Millions jackpot are 258,890,850 to one, the longest odds of any lottery game played in the United States. The chances of claiming the $1 million second prize, paid out for tickets matching the first five numbers, but not the Mega Ball number, are one in 18,492,204.

Even the relatively modest $5,000 Mega Millions third prize, which requires matching any four of the first five numbers plus the Mega Ball carries staggering odds. The chances are 739,688 to one.

The Mega Millions jackpot now stands at $59 million, the result of five straight drawings with no big winner. But despite the fact that the initial $15 million jackpot has nearly quadrupled in those five drawings, public interest in the game remains tepid.

Ticket sales for Tuesday’s drawing were 16,908,764. That’s a drop of about 300,000 from Friday’s game, despite a jackpot that was $10 million higher — $48 million up for grabs Tuesday night compared to $38 million on Friday.

The drop was the second time this month that ticket sales have dipped from one drawing to the next. The April 15 Mega Millions drawing with a $28 million jackpot attracted just 16,315,888 sales, compared to 16,901,932 for the previous drawing with its $20 million grand prize.

Nonetheless, there were more than a million Mega Millions tickets sold for Tuesday’s game that ended up winning something, mostly the minimum $1 prize — basically a free ticket. To be exact, there were 1,034,668 winners, or 6.1 percent of all tickets sold.

Yours could be one of them. Check your Mega Millions tickets against the following numbers.

218194950 Mega Ball 1

The Mega Millions drawing is held in Atlanta, Georgia, every Friday and Tuesday at 10:59 pm Eastern Time.

Share this article: Mega Millions Numbers Come Up Empty As Ticket Sales Drop Again
More from Inquisitr