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At least two winning tickets for big Powerball jackpot

Posted at 12:33 AM, Aug 08, 2013
and last updated 2013-08-08 00:33:42-04

(CNN) — The odds of getting hit by lightning in any given year are about one in 500,000. You are about 350 times LESS likely to win the Powerball lottery.

Wham!! Wham!! The lottery struck at least two lucky victims at the same time Wednesday night with a total jackpot of $448,000,000, said Powerball spokeswoman Judith Drucker.

The two are both in New Jersey, but there could still be additional winners in other states.

The winners each have a ticket in their pockets, purses or sock drawers with the winning numbers: 58, 5, 25, 59, 30….and Powerball number 32.

The odds of cracking one that big?

Who knows and who cares, when you’ve actually won the equivalent of about the net worth of Michael Jordan or Tiger Woods, according to Forbes magazine?

The size of U.S. lottery jackpots are growing, with almost no end in sight.

“You could see maybe in the next several years … an elusive billion-dollar jackpot,” said Victor Matheson, economics professor at College of the Holy Cross in Massachusetts.

Had no one won Wednesday evening, the prize would have swollen to an estimated $600 million for Saturday’s drawing, according to the Multi-State Lottery Association.

That’s not far from the all-time largest U.S. jackpot of $656 million in the Mega Millions game in March 2012. That was split among three tickets sold in Illinois, Kansas and Maryland.

Powerball is played in 43 states, the District of Columbia and the U.S. Virgin Islands. A single ticket costs $2.

Wednesday night’s winner will split a roughly $245 million lump sum.

They could buy 50 high-speed Bugatti Veyrons each to speed off to a life in the sun, far away from all those friends — they never knew that had — asking for a loan.