Clock ticking for claiming $500K Powerball prize-winning ticket purchased in Mason City

MASON CITY — Time is running out for someone to claim a $500,000 Powerball prize from a ticket purchased at a Mason City Kwik Star. The $500,000-winning ticket was purchased at the Kwik Star at 1502 South Federal in Mason City.

The prize was won not in a regular Powerball drawing but in the Powerball Double Play drawing on March 16th. It has to be claimed at Iowa Lottery headquarters in metro Des Moines by 4 o’clock Thursday afternoon.

Lottery spokeswoman Mary Neubauer says they had an event at the Kwik Star store last month in hopes of raising awareness about the unclaimed ticket, but so far nobody has stepped forward.  “So far it’s still just crickets. We haven’t heard from anyone who thinks they have the winning ticket. Interestingly, when we were up in Mason City at the store, it seems like a lot of folks going to that store knew about the prize and were talking about it, so I think that’s a good thing, but this $500,000 prize has to be claimed by 4:00 PM Thursday at Iowa Lottery headquarters in Clive, or the prize will expire. We still have our fingers crossed, you never can tell, but time is quickly slipping away.”

Neubauer says unclaimed prizes of this size are rare.  “This would be a life-changing amount of money, and certainly money of this size catches attention. There have just been two instances that I know of in about the last five years where two prizes of $1 million expired here in Iowa, that was the first time that had ever happened. This $500,000 winning ticket would be the third big one if it does expire.”

Neubauer says if you do have that winning ticket, you need to remember you have to go to the Des Moines metro area to claim it.  “For a prize of this size, the winner has to come to lottery headquarters in Clive. I said 4:00 PM because that’s when our prize validation equipment shuts down for the day, and once it’s shut down, we can’t bring it back up until the following business day, so that’s the deadline involved. Yes, we do have a regional office in Mason City, but that office can only pay prizes of up to $250,000. We have extra security procedures for a prize at the $500,000 level.”

The prize was won as part of the Double Play option that was added to the Powerball game in Iowa back in November which is a second drawing that takes place after the first drawing. Neubauer thinks it’s not likely someone would have overlooked a Double Play option ticket.  “That makes it a little more unusual. I would think that if somebody had a Double Play ticket they would remember it, but so far we haven’t been able to connect the dots on that one. We did hear from one person in Mason City months ago who thought they had had the winning ticket and lost it, but none of the fact they had about the ticket that they were remembering matched up with this particular ticket, so we were able to put that person’s mind at ease, but beyond that, we haven’t heard from anyone yet, so we just have our fingers crossed.”

Neubauer says if you have any questions you can contact the Iowa Lottery at 515-725-7900 or [email protected]. The winning Double Play numbers on that unclaimed ticket were: 9-11-13-29-69 and the Double Play Powerball of 12.