Lottery ticket worth more than half a million dollars sold at Bloomington gas station | Main stories

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. (NBC) – The Illinois lottery may have a lot to thank for this Thanksgiving holiday.

Someone won a $550,000 Lucky Day Lotto ticket at a Bloomington gas station, according to the Illinois Lottery.

The winning ticket was sold at Freedom Oil, located at 1801 S. Veterans Pkwy, according to the lottery. In it, all five numbers of the November 20 drawing matched to win the jackpot. These were the winning numbers: 9-12-16-33-44.

“Excitement and curiosity got the better of me, so I watched the videos recorded in our store to see who might have bought the winning ticket,” said Danielle Franks, store manager at Freedom Oil in Bloomington. “However, even after watching the tapes, I honestly don’t know, but whether it’s a local buyer or from out of town, we’re very happy that the ticket was purchased at our store.”

The gas station now receives a bonus of $5,500, or 1% of the prize, for selling the winning ticket.

“The retail bonus could not have been calculated more accurately,” Michael Owens, owner and president of Freedom Oil Company, said in a statement. “To show our appreciation to our hard-working managers and staff, we plan to add a lottery bonus to our annual Christmas bonus this year, making it a little more fun this festive season.”

The ticket marks the 28th win of $500,000 or more for Lucky Day Lotto this year in Illinois.

A total of more than 18,500 winning tickets were sold and nearly $600,000 won in the Nov. 20 Lucky Day Lotto drawing, according to the Illinois Lottery.

Winners have one year from the drawing date to claim their prize.