Rhonda Malesku of Kamloops has come forward as the lucky person who bought a lottery ticket worth $35 million.

Malesku, born and raised in Kamloops, purchased the Lotto Max ticket at Walmart on Hillside Drive while shopping for beach towels and didn’t anticipate she would match all seven numbers to split the $70-million jackpot with a winning ticket buyer in Alberta.

Malesku was at home when she discovered her massive windfall the morning after the July 25 draw. Upon checking the winning numbers online, she shared the news with her husband, who was in the backyard doing yard work at the time.

“I let out a huge scream and kept saying, ‘I won $35 million dollars!” Malesku said. “I opened up the back door and started screaming it outside to my husband, Sam, and we both started shaking! I was shouting so loud with excitement that the neighbours came out of their houses because they thought something was wrong.”

Malesku then called her daughter, who was getting ready for work at the time.

“I called my daughter and started screaming it all over again to her,” Malesku said. “She immediately dropped everything and came over. We couldn’t even get ready this morning because we were vibrating with excitement and had to help each other put on our makeup.”

Malesku said she has always wanted to design her dream home — and now she can tackle the dream. She also wants to do the same for her son and daughter. She said she will also gift some of the windfall to other family members and plans to purchase a travel trailer and truck and travel to the East Coast with her loved ones.

“I’m just absolutely blown away,” she said.

Lotto Max is a twice-weekly (Tuesdays and Fridays) draw in which players choose seven numbers between 1 and 50. The odds of matching all seven numbers is one in 33.3 million.

The winning numbers in the July 25 draw were 15, 16, 17,18, 43, 44 and 48. The bonus number, which applies to secondary prizes, was 50. Malesku chose the numbers, noting they were simply random digits.

The prize equals the largest ever won by a lottery ticket in Kamloops.

On June 23, 2021, when local resident Gary Hill won $35 million in that date’s Lotto Max draw, splitting the $70-million jackpot with one other lucky ticket buyer in Ontario. Hill purchased his winning ticket from McGoo’s Smokes N Stuff in Northills Centre in North Kamloops.

Did you know?

The retailer that sold the winning ticket — the Walmart lottery kiosk — will receive $35,000 from BCLC as part of its seller’s prize program. The program awards retailers who sell a winning ticket with a prize of more than $10,000 with a percentage of the prize paid (the percentage varies depending on the prize amount).

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