Mega Millions: Ticket among 4 in state worth at least $1M

The lucrative Mega Millions drawing Tuesday night didn’t produce any billionaires in Florida, but four tickets worth from $1 million to $3 million were sold in the state — including one that was sold in South Florida.

The winning $3 million ticket was sold at a Race Trac gas station on South John Young Parkway in Orlando, lottery officials said.

One of the $1 million tickets was purchased at a United Fuel gas station at 6900 SW Eighth St. in Miami-Dade County. The two others were sold at a Publix supermarket in Lake Mary, about 20 miles north of Orlando, and at a 7-Eleven in Tampa.

In total, more than a million tickets sold in Florida for Tuesday’s drawing won some money — ranging from $2 to $30,000 in addition to the four prizes of $1 million or more.

As for the jackpot-winning ticket — it was sold in South Carolina and ends up being worth $1.537 billion.

An earlier Mega Millions estimate of $1.6 billion would have been a world record for lotteries, but actual sales came in below the $1.586 billion Powerball jackpot prize shared by winners in California, Florida and Tennessee in January of 2016.

According to Mega Millions officials, the ticket was sold at a convenience store in Simpsonville, South Carolina, a small town outside Greenville. As a lump-sum cash payment, which most winners choose, the ticket is worth about $877 million to the winner.

But the identity of the winner, or winners, may never be known.

South Carolina is one of eight states — along with Delaware, Georgia, Kansas, Maryland, North Dakota, Ohio and Texas — where winners can remain anonymous. The winner also has up to 180 days to claim the prize.

"Our board has a policy to protect the winner because of all the risk associated with having that much money," South Carolina Education Lottery Director William Hogan Brown told ABC's "Good Morning America.The winning numbers drawn Tuesday night were: 5, 28, 62, 65, 70 and the mega number 5.

And if you find that you are not mega-lucky from Tuesday night’s drawing, there’s always Powerball. The multi-state Powerball drawing set for Wednesday night has a jackpot that has soared to $620 million.

The next Mega Millions drawing is set for Friday night with an estimated jackpot of $40 million.