Worcester woman claims £33m winning lottery ticket destroyed in washing machine

The woman rushed to her local newsagent with a damaged piece of paper which she claims features the winning combination of numbers

(PA)

A woman has claimed to have put a £33m winning lottery ticket in the wash.

The woman rushed to her local newsagent in Worcester with a damaged piece of paper which she believed featured the winning combination of numbers but the date, bar code and serial number had all been washed off, according to the Times.

Newsagent owner Natu Patel said he has no way of checking if the winning ticket was bought in his shop unless he can scan it.

The woman, who has not been named, allegedly left the ticket in a pair of jeans and put it in the washing machine. She has not yet been able to prove that her ticket is genuine.

Lottery operator Camelot has confirmed it is aware of the case and is investigating, according to the Daily Mail.

The unclaimed £33m is half of the overall jackpot, after couple David and Carol Martin from Hawick also guessed the six winning numbers correctly.

The jackpot wouldn’t be the largest to go unclaimed. In 2012, a winning Euromillions ticket worth £63.8m bought in the Stevenage and Hitchen area was never found.