$1.6B Powerball to Be Split Between Three Winners

The winners of the record $1.6 billion U.S. Powerball jackpot had yet to emerge early on Thursday, with lottery officials saying the massive prize will be split between ticket holders in three states – Tennessee, California and Florida.

Each of the three winning tickets is worth $528.8 million, the California Lottery said.

The winning numbers were 4-8-19-27-34 and Powerball 10.

The first announced winning ticket was sold at a 7-Eleven in Chino Hills, California, Traverso said. The 7-Eleven will get a $1 million bonus for selling the winning ticket.

The store and its surrounding strip mall immediately became a wildly popular gathering spot in the usually quiet Los Angeles suburb. Media footage showed hundreds of people, from news crews to gawkers, crowding the store and spilling into its parking lot.

Traverso had no further information on where the tickets in Tennessee and Florida were sold, and none of the winners’ identities have yet been revealed. Representatives for the Tennessee and Florida lotteries couldn’t immediately be reached for comment.

Officials with the Multi-State Lottery Association, which runs the Powerball game, said they expected that more than 85 percent of the possible number combinations would have been bought for the drawing. The odds of winning were 1 in 292.2 million.

Winners have to pay 39.6 percent of the prize in federal income taxes, in addition to any state taxes.

Estimated jackpot amounts, which are released daily, have been steadily rising since Nov. 4, when the jackpot was reset at $40 million.

Powerball tickets are sold in 44 states, as well as the District of Columbia, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

But residents in the six states that don’t participate found ways to get their hands on tickets. Some of the biggest Powerball sales have come from cities bordering states that don’t sell the tickets, according to the Multi-State Lottery Association. The association oversees the Powerball Lottery, but management rotates annually among member states.