By Steve Neville
Two lucky Lotto players were in Dublin today to pick up their €500,000 EuroMillions Plus prize.
The separate winners, from Kerry and Meath, visited it Lotto HQ to claim their prize.
Three players won the top prize in the Plus draw last Tuesday, with each scooping €500,000.
The search for the third winner is ongoing, but the other two were in celebration mode today.
The first winner to collect his cheque was a Kerry native, who is keeping his win private.
He picked up his winning Quick Pick ticket at the Centra store on the Rock Road in Killarney town.
"This win means the absolute world to me and my family," said the winner.
"Word went around the town last week that the winning ticket was sold on the Rock Road and knowing that I had bought my ticket there, I was afraid to check it for hours, knowing that there was a possibility that I could be the big winner.
It was one of those feelings where I just knew it was me -when I finally did pluck up the courage to scan it on my phone App, it came as no surprise to see the winner’s message popping up on my phone.
"It was just pure class."
The Kerry man said he will use his winnings on his family's mortgage and bills before treating his family.
"We are a very hardworking family and like everybody else, we have bills and mortgage payments every month.
"While it’s not at the €190m level, this prize allows us to pay off our mortgage and it gives us so many options for the future of our family, it is truly life-changing for us."
The second winners, a couple from Meath, were shocked to learn that they would get the whole €500,000.
"We genuinely thought we were sharing the €500,000 prize with the two other winners from Kerry and Dublin," they said.
"We heard that there were three winners of the Plus top prize that night and we thought we had won €166,666 each.
"Obviously we were delighted with that but to have the €500,000 all to ourselves is even better."
The couple purchased their Quick Pick ticket at Ryan’s Foodstore in Rathmolyon.
"It was the evening after the draw and I was aimlessly scrolling through Facebook on my phone when I spotted a post about the local shop selling the winning EuroMillions ticket," they added.
"My heart nearly jumped through my chest, knowing that we could have a winning ticket.
"We just cannot wait to pop into our local bank manager and give him the news that we’ll be making one final payment on our mortgage this week."
Tonight, the EuroMillions jackpot is heading for a historic €190m jackpot.
The huge prize has been rolling since Tuesday, July 23.
For the first time in the history of the game, the jackpot is guaranteed to be won or shared at lower prize tiers, at which there is a winner.
This means that if there is no winner of the €190m tonight, the full value of the jackpot will flow down to the next prize tier, with a possibility of multiple millionaires across the entire EuroMillions community.
