Mega Millions jackpot nears $1 billion ahead of Friday night’s drawing
Mega Millions lottery tickets sit inside a convenience store in Lower Manhattan, (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
(NEW YORK) — The Mega Millions jackpot is now the eighth largest in history ahead of Friday night’s drawing where one lucky person could win an estimated $965 million.
The jackpot grew from $900 million to where it currently stands after no ticket matched all six numbers drawn Tuesday night.
The jackpot was last won on June 27.
The prize has a cash value of $445.3 million which can be offered as a one-time lump sum payment or an immediate payment followed by 29 annual payments.
After four jackpot wins in the first half of this year, Friday’s drawing will be the 40th drawing in this run, a game record, since it was last won in Virginia on June 27.
Even though nobody won the jackpot on Tuesday night, there were 809,030 winning tickets across all prize tiers for total nationwide winnings of more than $27.9 million, according to Mega Millions.
The odds of winning the jackpot at 1 in 290,472,336, according to Mega Millions.Mega Millions is played in 45 states, Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Tickets are $5 for one play.
The largest Mega Millions jackpot prize ever won was $1.6 billion prize won on Aug. 8, 2023.
In this photo released by the Norwich Fire Department, a train derailment is shown in Mansfield, Conn., on Feb. 5, 2026. (Norwich Fire Department)
(MANSFIELD, Calif.) — A freight train carrying flammable liquids derailed in Connecticut on Thursday, prompting a shelter-in-place advisory, officials said.
Approximately 14 railcars of a New England Central Railroad (NECR) train went off the tracks shortly after 9 a.m. in Mansfield near a body of water, fire officials said.
Six railcars carrying liquid propane went fully off the track, with four ending up in water, officials said.
Other derailed cars were carrying liquified natural gas and cooking grease, according to Mansfield Fire Chief John Roache.
The derailment occurred along the Willimantic River, near Eagleville Lake, according to NECR.
Air monitoring has not detected any flammable leaks from any of the train cars, Roache said during a press briefing Thursday. An NECR spokesperson also said there is no indication of any leaks.
Richard Scalora, a supervising emergency response coordinator with the state’s Department of Energy and Environmental Protection, said his staff is working on several of the railcars to “assure that we don’t have any releases.”
“We’re going to continue in this position until all the rail cars are back on their wheels and safely removed from the area,” he said during the press briefing.
All residents within a half-mile of the area have been advised to shelter in place out of an abundance of caution, due to concerns over a potential natural gas leak, officials said.
No injuries have been reported, according to an NECR spokesperson.
“First responders are on scene with NECR managers to assess the situation,” the spokesperson said in a statement. “Emergency response contractors are also en route to assist with an expeditious cleanup.”
The cleanup is anticipated to take several days due to the hard-to-reach location, with crews working to gain access to the site and bring in cranes, according to Roache.
“It’s not going to be a today operation,” he said. “We’re definitely taking it slow and methodical.”
Mansfield Town Manager Ryan Aylesworth said he will be issuing an emergency declaration later Thursday, calling it a “very serious event.”
“We are blessed with natural resources in this community that we want to safeguard, and certainly potential hazardous waste spill is a serious concern,” he said during the briefing. “Fortunately, right now, it appears that the situation is under control and the public health and safety is being maintained.”
Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont said he is in touch with “our state emergency management and environment teams to assess any impacts regarding the train derailment involving hazardous materials in Mansfield.”
(NEW YORK) — Just a week before Thanksgiving, record-breaking heat is hitting parts of the South, with some cities setting daily records as temperatures rise 10 to 20 degrees above average.
Cities across Texas experienced record-high temperatures on Tuesday, with Waco reaching 87 degrees and Austin hitting 86 degrees. Dallas, which hit a high of 87 degrees on Tuesday, has not seen temperatures this warm this late into the year in 20 years.
Houston also shattered records on Tuesday, as it saw a temperature over 80 degrees for a record 245th day this year. The previous record of 243 days was set in 2012. This record could continue to grow, as Houston — which has only had 77 days of weather cooler than 80 degrees — will see temperatures in the low- to mid-80s for the rest of the week.
From Wednesday through Friday, record-high temperatures are possible from Houston to Charlotte, North Carolina, and areas farther south.
Other cities experiencing unseasonably warm weather include Jackson, Mississippi, which could see the temperature reach 81 degrees on Thursday, along with Atlanta, with highs consistently in the high 70s for the rest of the week.
This heat, which will move out of the South this weekend, will allow for a flood threat to develop from Texas to Missouri on Thursday.
While the heat lingers in the South, parts of the Southeast and Northeast will see temperatures “cooler than normal at times,” according to the National Weather Service.
This year, the El Niño-Southern Oscillation — a natural variation of warmer, neutral and cooler waters along the equatorial waters of the eastern Pacific — has been in the cooler pattern, or La Niña, since September and is expected to continue for much of winter.
This likely puts the U.S. in a dominant weather pattern for most of the winter, keeping the southern half of the country warmer and drier and the Pacific Northwest out to the Great Lakes cooler and wetter than average.
