SEARCH NEWS:

 

Powerball Drawing Delayed

UNITED STATES – (PRESS RELEASE) -- The Powerball drawing for Wednesday, May 25, 2005, was delayed 42 minutes due to a minor problem with Powerball security procedures. The drawing was held in the presence of a city police officer and an independent auditing firm, was videotaped, and was displayed on the Powerball website at Powerball.com.

The official numbers drawn were: 27-29-31-42-46 and the red Powerball: 33.

The Power Play multiplier was 2. The jackpot was estimated at $180 million but turned out to be $182 million with a cash option of $103.2 million.

Before a drawing can be held, Powerball rules require that every state involved in the game confirm that two identical copies of the play data are in the possession of independent computer systems. One of the member lotteries (Iowa) was unable to confirm that two valid copies of the data were held by independent parties and so the drawing was delayed until both sites could be secured by lottery officials.

"We understand that security and trust is the most important product that a lottery has to sell," said Chuck Strutt, director of the group that is owned and operated by the 29 lotteries that run the Powerball game. "The lotteries require absolute assurance that the computer records of the players' tickets are complete, balanced, and secure. If we cannot get that assurance by draw time, then we delay the drawing until we are assured that every player's ticket is properly recorded and secured. Nobody likes to delay a drawing for a big jackpot like this, but security never takes a backseat to public relations."

The drawing was delayed past the satellite time reserved by the Multi- State Lottery Association and so could not be uplinked to the more than 90 television stations that air the drawing. The drawing was videotaped in front of drawing officials, which include a city police officer and an independent auditing firm. The drawing is also available at the Powerball web site.

The Power Play is a feature that allows players to multiply their prizes by the multiplier number drawn. The most common number drawn is "5", but players can also multiply their numbers by 2, 3, or 4. On March 31, 110 players used numbers from a Chinese fortune cookie to match five of the numbers drawn to win Powerball's second prize of $100,000 in cash. There were 21 players who also purchased the Power Play option and multiplied their prize by five to win a half-million dollars in cash.

< Gaming News