B.C. man found out he won the lottery during a power outage

Lotto 6/49 winner Shawn O'Brien is pictured in a handout photo from BCLC.

A Penticton resident was in the dark when he found out he had won a shiny prize.

Shawn O’Brien was on vacation in Meziadin, B.C. when he woke up to a power outage. He “decided it was the perfect time to check his ticket,” recounts a news release from the B.C. Lottery Corporation released last week.

That’s when O’Brien found out he had won $342,776.20 from the Sept. 13 Lotto 6/49 draw.

“I sat still for a few minutes in disbelief and then checked it three more times to make sure it was real,” he recalls.

The first person O’Brien told was his wife, who he says was “shocked and in disbelief.”

The couple celebrated the win with a steak dinner, and plan to use the money to pay off their mortgage, BCLC writes.

According to BCLC, British Columbians have redeemed more than $92 million in winnings from Lotto 6/49 draws this year.

The lottery corporation did not specify how many numbers O’Brien’s ticket matched, and the prize amount from matches of four out of six or five out of six vary depending on how many people played, so the odds of winning his exact prize are unavailable. However, the odds of winning Lotto 6/49’s top prize of $5 million are one in 13,983,816.