Powerball mania has hit Chautauqua County. With a powerball jackpot over $500 million, many were out on Wednesday to get their last-minute tickets.
The multi-state lotto game has a jackpot of $550 million after a winless jackpot in Saturday's drawing. With such a high jackpot, people were out buying their tickets.
"Everyone wants to play," Matt's News owner Nathan Dolce said.
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OBSERVER Photo by Matt Panebianco
Matt’s News employee Adam VandeVelde sells Gladys Lockett a Powerball ticket. The jackpot is $550 million.
Dolce said that many people have been buying tickets throughout the week for the drawing on Saturday. Since the jackpot was not won last Saturday, the volume of ticket sales tripled at Matt's News on Third Street, Dunkirk, including many people purchasing tickets in a group.
"We have a lot of people pooling money together," Dolce said. "(Matt's News) saw a significant increase over normal ticket sales ... three times the amount."
In addition to Matt's News, Rick's One Stop on Lake Shore Drive was full of people wanting to buy a ticket as well. Employee Aimee Kaufman said tickets sales were increased on Saturday as well as Wednesday.
"(Ticket sales) are nonstop," Kaufman said.
The last big jackpot for lotto was when the Mega Millions hit over $600 million in March. Dolce said that was the last time he saw ticket sales significantly increase.
"Everyone wants to win and everybody has their own ideas of what they'd do," Dolce said.
The winning numbers were drawn late Wednesday evening and are posted at www.powerball.com.
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