Sierra Daley, who sells Chase the Ace tickets along with other volunteers on Friday afternoons, has revealed that she has never seen so many people eager to take part in the lottery.
The woman told CBC News that at one point last Friday there were more than 50 trucks waiting to get on the ferry into Fort McPherson, Northwest Territories. All of them were aimed at taking a chance and see whether they would be lucky to take home the Chase the Ace jackpot which rose to CA$98,000. The prize became so large that it has been attracting people living all over the Beaufort Delta region to Fort McPherson, a hamlet located in the Inuvik Region where around 800 people currently live.
Ms. Daley, who is also a member of the Peel River Jamboree committee, explained that the massive lineups started quite early on Friday. As mentioned above, Ms. Daley is currently engaged with selling Chase the Ace tickets in order to raise enough money for the annual spring event. Part of the money raised is planned to be used for buying prizes for the local jamboree that usually involves snowmobile races and other games.
The Chase the Ace fundraiser was rolled out in September 2017. In the beginning, there were only a few people who bought tickets, but since then, the prizes offered by the lottery have risen immensely, and so did the interest in the draws.
Chase the Ace Lottery Draws Become Increasingly Popular
Currently, Chase the Ace ticket are sold at CA$5 apiece. One-third of the ticket sales’ amount goes into the jackpot, another third is used to fund the above-mentioned jamboree, while the final portion of the ticket sales forms the consolation prize.
In order for a player whose ticket is drawn to win the lottery jackpot, they need to choose the ace from a number of cards laid face down in front of them. In case that the jackpot is not won, it continues to grow, and the player is granted a consolation prize. As reminded by Ms. Daley, the draw which took place last Friday saw a person walk away with a consolation prize amounting to CA$25,883.
The next draw in the Chase the Ace lottery in Fort McPherson is scheduled for October 12th. Since nobody managed to win the jackpot last week, the latter has continued to pile up.
Due to the large prizes, the interest towards the lottery has been lately rising. The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) has been helping the organizers of the lottery draws by storing the amount gathered in a safe place after the draw. Sierra Daley was unable to say the exact number of tickets sold last week but explained that organizers went through several rolls of lottery tickets.
