Three winning tickets sold

DES MOINES, Iowa - The allure of capturing the latest massive Powerball jackpot had players in a buying frenzy, further confirming a trend that lottery officials say has become the big ticket norm: Fatigued Powerball players, increasingly blase about smaller payouts, often don't get into the game until the jackpot offers big bucks.

Three tickets - one sold in Minnesota and two in New Jersey - matched Wednesday's winning numbers, Sue Dooley, senior drawing manager production coordinator for the Multi-State Lottery Association, said late Wednesday night. She said it wasn't yet clear exactly where the tickets had been sold or who the winners were.

The numbers drawn Wednesday night were: 05, 25, 30, 58, 59 and Powerball 32.

At the time of the telecast, Powerball officials announced that the jackpot previously pegged at $425 million had grown to an estimated $448 million.

Meghan Graham, a convenience store worker from Brookline, Mass., has purchased nearly a dozen Powerball tickets in recent months thanks to the huge jackpots, and the third largest-ever pot was enough reason to buy again.

"The more it keeps increasing, that means nobody is winning ... a lot of people are gonna keep buying tickets and tickets and tickets and you never know, you just might get lucky if you pick the right numbers," she said.

A recent game change intended to build excitement about the lottery increased the frequency of huge jackpots, and Wednesday's jackpot drawing comes only a few months after the biggest Powerball jackpot in history - a $590 million pot won in Florida by an 84-year-old widow. The second largest Powerball jackpot was won in November and split between two tickets from Arizona and Missouri.

With a majority of the top 10 Powerball jackpots being reached in the last five years, lottery officials acknowledge smaller jackpots don't create the buzz they once did.

"We certainly do see what we call jackpot fatigue," said Chuck Strutt, executive director of the Multi-State Lottery Association. "I've been around a long time, and remember when a $10 million jackpot in Illinois brought long lines and people from surrounding states to play that game."

Tom Romero, CEO of the New Mexico Lottery and chairman of the Powerball Group, agreed.

"Many years ago, $100 million was really exciting and people would immediately buy more, occasional players would start buying," he said. "Then the threshold was $200 million. Now, we see here in New Mexico, we're approaching the $300 million mark."

The revamp of Powerball in January 2012 changed the price of a ticket from $1 to $2, a move that upped the chances of the game reaching a major jackpot. There was a loss in the number of players, but the new game - which also created more chances to win smaller, $1 million- and $2 million prizes - has brought in 52 percent more in sales, Strutt said. Sales were $5.9 billion in the fiscal year that ended in June.

Inferno roars through Kenya airport

NAIROBI, Kenya (AP) - A small fire at Kenya's main airport swelled into a roaring inferno Wednesday that destroyed part of East Africa's largest aviation hub and hampered air travel across the continent.

Firefighters were desperately short of equipment in an area where the county government apparently lacks a single working fire engine. Crews needed hours to get the flames under control and at one point resorted to a line of officers passing water buckets.

The early morning blaze gutted the arrival hall, forcing authorities to close the entire airport and airlines to cancel dozens of flights. The flames also charred banks and foreign exchange bureaus.

No serious injuries were reported.

The fire broke out on the 15th anniversary of the bombings by al-Qaida of the U.S. embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam, in neighboring Tanzania. No terror connection to the fire was immediately evident.