Just days to claim €1m lottery prize
Lotto bosses were in Cork yesterday to launch a massive publicity blitz in a bid to find the owner of the unclaimed €1m EuroMillionaire Quick Pick ticket which was sold at the Eason outlet in Wilton Shopping Centre on February 23. The 90-day claim period expires next Thursday.
They said they are very anxious to ensure that another €1m doesn’t go unclaimed in Cork after intensive efforts to find the owner of a €1m ticket sold in Tivoli on December 31 last failed.
National Lottery spokesman Fran Whearty said: “We have had winners come forward on the last hour of the last day. I dealt with a syndicate from Midleton recently, who won €400,000 on the EuroMillions, and who came forward at 4.30pm on the day of the deadline. We made arrangements for them to collect their prize. So, there is still time.”
He was speaking in Wilton Shopping Centre yesterday as middleweight boxing champ, Gary Spike O’Sullivan, just happened to stop by the shop to check his own Lotto tickets from April 4 and 11. He didn’t quite land a winner though, pocketing just €5. “I play the Lotto all the time, I’ve been doing it for years but I’ve had more than my fair share of tickets expire over the years.”
The Mahon-based boxer, who is preparing for a huge bout in Las Vegas in September which could lead to a shot at a world title, said:
“I am very close to achieving my goal. But even if I won the EuroMillions, I wouldn’t turn that down.”
The February 23 draw, the day before Ireland played Wales in the Six Nations, included a special EuroMillionaire raffle with 25 guaranteed prizes of €1m through participating EuroMillions countries. Ireland claimed one of those €1m prizes.
Martina Walsh, the manager of Eason in Wilton, said she and all the staff really hope the winner comes forward: “There was great excitement here after the draw, amongst the staff and customers. We have a lot of local customers, and we’d know them on a first-name basis and we were asking was it them, and they were asking us the same.”
But the shop has a lot of passing trade too, from people visiting relatives in Cork University Hospital.
The National Lottery urged people to check their tickets between now and next week — the winning raffle code is I-DKB-06633. All unclaimed Lottery money goes back into promoting the game and funding good causes.
Meanwhile, another Cork player came agonisingly close to winning Wednesday’s €2m Lotto jackpot. The ticket, sold at SuperValu in Townspark, Midleton, has bagged the owner €42,271 for matching five numbers and the bonus, and a luxury holiday worth €20,000.
You can check your Lotto tickets in-store, online, or via the Lotto app, or by contacting the National Lottery Prize Claims Team on
01-836 4444.
