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Mega Millions rockets to record $476 million

By Peter Mucha
Inquirer Staff Writer


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Welcome to jackpot freak-out.


Even major media outlets like Good Morning America are going gaga over Mega Millions smashing through the $400 million barrier, soaring toward the half-billion-dollar mark, and rewriting the record book.
Forty-seven tickets, including two in Pennsylvania and two in New Jersey, just missed last night. They matched the first five numbers - 9, 19, 34, 44 and 51 - but not the Mega Ball of 24.
Most will win $250,000 - instead of more than 1,000 times that much.
The annuity jackpot rocketed to $476 million for Friday night's drawing - obliterating the old U.S. mark of $390 million set by Mega Millions in March 2007.
The $120 million jump in the annuity also was a record, beating the $115 million also witnessed in March 2007.
The cash jackpot clobbered its own record, catapulting from $259 million to $341 million - $101 million more than the second-biggest cash jackpot ever, the $240 million reached by Mega Millions in January last year. (See list of record jackpots: http://bit.ly/Hd1oJ8.)
If piled in a single stack of $1 bills, the cash windfall could start at the bottommost spot of the ocean and still tower above Mount Everest.If paid at the rate of $1 every minute, the payout would take more than 600 years.