Having bought his Lotto 6/49 ticket at a Lower Sackville Esso station and added TAG and Atlantic 49, Osmond quickly checked the winning numbers and could not believe his luck. “The feeling that went over me - I never experienced a feeling like that before in my life. It was awesome,” he said, as quoted by CBC News.
Despite the shock he felt, Osmond continued to act quickly as he immediately decided it was time to retire and let go of his truck. He explained: “I called my boss and said I wouldn’t be in for Monday morning. He said, ‘Are you OK? Are you sick or anything?’ And I said ‘No, no, no, I just won a million dollars.’ He said ‘are you serious?’ and was just ecstatic. He was really, really happy for me.”
As Osmond looks forward to retirement and plans a trip to see his family in Newfoundland, lottery officials in Canada are still waiting for the biggest jackpot ever to have been won in the country to be claimed. One ticket matched the winning Lotto 6/49 numbers in the draw on Saturday 17th October.
The entry, purchased in Mississauga, Ontario, is worth CA$64 million to the player or syndicate who played the winning numbers and Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation spokesman Tony Bitonti has urged the owner of the ticket to come forward. He told the Toronto Sun: “My concern about holding a big winning ticket is that I might lose it. We really would like people to put it into our system and that means validating the ticket.”
The winner has a year from the date of the draw to claim their prize and Bitonti admitted there was no pattern as to how long players take to step forward, proving that while some ticket holders like to consider their options carefully before claiming a prize, others like Bruce Osmond act astonishingly quickly.
