A Philadelphia interstate billboard mistakenly told onlookers Wednesday that the Mega Millions jackpot prize had skyrocketed to $13.5 billion, a colossal sum higher than the gross domestic product of 76 countries.
A billboard on Philadelphia’s I-95 apparently misplaced a decimal, deceiving spectators into thinking the $1.35 billion jackpot was actually ten times larger, NBC10 reported. The Pennsylvania lottery reportedly fixed the mistake after local affiliate NBC10 notified them of the issue.
The $1.3 billion prize, expected to be drawn on Jan. 13, remains the second-largest Mega Millions prize in history, the outlet reported.
Mega Millions is a lottery game available in 45 states as well as the District of Columbia and the U. S. Virgin Islands, according to the Mega Millions website. Tickets cost $2 each. To win the jackpot, a player must correctly pick five numbers between 1 and 70 and a sixth number — the “gold Mega Ball” — between 1 and 25, the website explains. Tickets with fewer matched numbers win smaller prizes, ranging from $2 to $1 million.
The odds of winning the jackpot on any given ticket are 1 in 302,575,350, Mega Millions notes.
This was spotted on a billboard along Interstate 95 in Philadelphia — and it is not factually correct. https://t.co/IhEq4AZrjq
— NBC New York (@NBCNewYork) January 11, 2023
A $13.5 billion jackpot would have been larger than the annual economic output of 76 countries, including Samoa, San Marino, Chad, and Fiji, according to data from the World Bank. The massive sum would sit solidly between the GDPs of the Republic of the Congo ($13.4 billion) and Moldova ($13.7 billion). (RELATED: Man Charged With Locking Pizza Delivery Driver In His Apartment Over Missing Soda)
Even with the jackpot valued at one-tenth of what the billboard had stated, the stakes for the Mega Millions haven’t been so high since the $1.5 billion pot in 2019. The South Carolina winner of that prize opted for an $878 million payout after waiting months to claim the bounty.