Man checks lottery ticket after family vacation — then sees life-changing Idaho prize
A man got home from his family vacation and decided to check some lottery tickets in Idaho.
One ticket was worth $1 million.
Alberto Vega bought Idaho $1,000,000 Raffle tickets from a Maverik convenience store in Burley for the Dec. 30 drawing, the Idaho Lottery said in a Jan. 16 news release.
The Heyburn man didn’t realize his win until after his vacation, he told lottery officials.
That’s when he checked the lottery’s Instagram page and saw his ticket matched one of the winning numbers.
Vega turned to his wife with the news, lottery officials said.
“She looked at the ticket, then Instagram, and her heart began to race. She couldn’t believe it,” lottery officials said.
Now, Vega, who lives in Magic Valley, has plans to put the money toward his family and paying off their home.
There were two winning $1 million tickets from the lottery game, McClatchy News previously reported. The other ticket was sold in Ada County and hasn’t been claimed yet.
The winning numbers are 063647 and 116293.
Two other tickets worth $10,000 were sold in Ada and Cassia counties, lottery officials said. Those winning numbers are 139464 and 287203.
The ticket sold in Ada County was claimed by Chad Gilmore from Eagle, lottery officials said.
“This is turning out to be a pretty great day! I had no idea I had one of the big winners,” Gilmore told the lottery office.
He bought the ticket from a Jacksons convenience store in Meridian.
The second $10,000 prize hasn’t been claimed.
Tickets cost $10 each for the Idaho $1,000,000 Raffle game, and 450,000 tickets were put on sale for it.
Once a player wins, they have 180 days to claim their prize at the Idaho Lottery Headquarters in Boise.
Burley and Heyburn are both about an 160-mile drive southeast from Boise.
