$15m jackpot goes to ticket from Hastings

The new year looks a whole lot better for one lucky person, who picked up $15 million in the Big Wednesday draw last night.

The winning ticket was sold at the Caltex Station on Karamu Rd in Hastings, which also sold the second division-winning ticket - presumably to the same person.

Lotto spokeswoman Victoria Barton-Chapple said it had been an exciting run, as the jackpot had been rolling over since September 12, when a Tauranga man in his twenties won $27 million.

Ms Barton-Chapple said interest had become increasingly high as the jackpot grew.

"It's been running for a long time and we've just been waiting and waiting for it to go and tonight it's finally happened," she said.

"Obviously we don't know at this stage whether the winner is a local or someone passing through - it could be someone on holiday."

The jackpot is one of the biggest to be won by a single Big Wednesday winner in recent years.

The biggest ever prize, $36 million, was won by a family syndicate in Masterton in 2009.

Last September in Tauranga, a young man who described himself as a "typical Kiwi bloke" won the big prize after he went to get a haircut and found that the barber was closed.

He decided to use the money on a Big Wednesday ticket.