County Durham Family Thunderball Syndicate Claims £500,000

A family from County Durham won the £500,000 Thunderball jackpot just over a year after the mother of the group passed away. Widower Walter, his daughters Joanne and Christina and son Gary continued playing Eva Knowles’ favourite game in honour of her memory and believe she was looking down on them when they won the top prize.

They pitched in for a ticket each as a way of commemorating Eva, but never thought they would end up half a million pounds richer. “You obviously always hope and dream that you will win,” Christina told lottery officials, “but you never really believe that you will – things like this just don’t happen to families like us.”

However, the night before their numbers came up, former miner Walter dreamt they would come into money. In the premonition, the family won Lotto, but Christina believes the reason they struck gold on Thunderball was down to her late mother.

The family pledged to buy Walter a new bungalow and described their joint win in May 2016 as “wonderful”.

For more details on this fun game, with great odds of winning, visit the Thunderball page.