According to Jan Hannig, a UNC-Chapel Hill statistics professor it's not impossibly rare to win the lottery twice and Terry Splawn from North Carolina is living proof that it can happen.
Officials from the North Carolina Education Lottery were delighted to award Terry his second $1 million prize this week, less than two years after presenting him with his first $1 million cheque.
In a further twist of fate the twice lucky winner purchased both winning tickets from the same store. Sam's Mini Stop on Old Charlotte Road in Concord
“What are the odds of this happening?” Splawn said. “I can't believe I won the lottery not once, but twice!”
"This is rare, but not impossibly rare," Jan Hannig, a UNC-Chapel Hill statistics professor, said of the odds of the same person winning two $1 million lottery prizes.
His first run of good luck came in April 2017 beating odds of 1 in 1.248 million with a Millionaire Bucks ticket and his second run of good luck came this month from a $150 Million Cash Explosion scratch-off ticket which offers odds of winning $1 million at 1 in 1.8 million players.
Terry has opted to take the $600,000 lump sum from his second win, taking home $424,506 after tax witholdings. He plans to save the funds for a rainy day.
"My wife spent most of the last prize remodeling our home," Splawn told lottery officials. "I'm keeping this one. I'm going to put it aside for a rainy day."