A lottery player in Bitonto, southern Italy, nearly lost a €1 million winning ticket after mistakenly discarding it. The anonymous player had checked his numbers at a shop and was informed the ticket was "non-payable," leading him to dispose of it. He only realized his error when a relative pointed out that the numbers he consistently played had been drawn.
This realization prompted a two-day search through a substantial amount of waste collected by a bin lorry. Roberto Nicola Toscano, head of the waste collection company SANB, described the situation as "miraculous." The "non-payable" message, Toscano explained, is displayed when a prize exceeds the amount a local shop can dispense.
Upon returning home, the player's family recognized his usual numbers – 2, 4, 8, 10, and 51 – had been drawn. This confirmed the misunderstanding and led the player and his family to the shop, where they discovered the ticket had already been collected by a waste disposal truck.
After the player contacted the refuse company, the specific bin lorry was located before its contents were compacted. The recovery operation was fortunate to occur on a Sunday, as the waste would have otherwise been sent to landfill on Monday. The truck was then taken to a designated site for the extensive search.
On Tuesday morning, a waste worker reportedly found the winning ticket amidst a large volume of trash. It was discovered within a damaged bag, alongside other discarded tickets, and was described as one of the few intact items. The winner had previously signed a declaration agreeing to cover any costs associated with the search operation.
In a peculiar twist, Toscano and his colleagues played a scratch card as a joke after the ticket's recovery and won €50.