LOTTERY WEBSITE CRASHES FOLLOWING A LAST MINUTE DASH FOR TICKETS... AS TWO JACKPOT WINNERS SHARE £66million

Thousands hoping to win a record £57.8million National Lottery jackpot were left furious when the website crashed under a flood of last-minute entries.

But despite the internet meltdown, Britons still spent £2.8million, snapping up 1.4million tickets in stores in the final hour before sales ended. 

Two jackpot winners tonight shared £66million - £33million in total - after having the six winning numbers, which were 26, 27, 46, 47, 52 and 58.

The staggering sum came after 14 consecutive rollovers found no winner.
 

A National Lottery spokesperson said: 'What an amazing way to start off the New Year! Two players shared tonight's biggest-ever Lotto jackpot, and each ticket-holder will be starting 2016 £33m richer.

'As well as the jackpot, as with every draw, the Lotto Millionaire Raffle created yet another guaranteed millionaire.

'We urge all our players to check their tickets and, of course, we have plenty of Champagne on ice ready to welcome these winners into the National Lottery millionaires club.'  

Earlier, National Lottery organisers Camelot said its website struggled following 'unprecedented' demand for tickets ahead of the draw. 

One customer claimed they first experienced problems on the website at 2pm yesterday, and it was only working intermittently throughout the afternoon.

The site fully crashed at 6pm, an hour-and-a-half before sales closed.

Before the crash, people also reported problems with their purchases, complaining they could not view their ticket numbers. 

Meanwhile Barclays' Pingit app, which has a built-in function to purchase National Lottery tickets, has also been affected by Lotto website's outage. 

Angry customers deluged social media with complaints.

One Twitter user, named Laura, said: 'Why isn't national lottery website working I wanna spend my last tenner on 10 tickets cuz I've already spent that £60m jackpot.'

Another, Emma, tweeted: 'Stupid #NationalLottery website. It never works when you need it.

Jennie Jordan added: 'National Lottery website is down: disaster. Sent other half out in rain to buy expensive rubbish or life-changing ticket: phew #hopeitsme'.

The National Lottery's Twitter account warned: 'Our online services are temporarily unavailable due to exceptional demand. Please try again shortly.' 

People were instead urged to buy tickets at the 37,000 retail outlets stocking them.

Lotto's website seemed to slow on Saturday afternoon as thousands of desperate buyers flocked to buy their tickets online

There was no winner of the Lotto jackpot of £50.4million on Wednesday, with the result that it rolls over to tomorrow night and a new record of £57.8million

Even before the online chaos, Britons descended on corner shops and supermarkets in a bid to grab tickets before the 7.30pm deadline.  

In 2012, Romford in Essex was named the luckiest town in Britain after having the highest number of lottery winners – scooping more than £50,000 since the draw began in 1994.

Ronak Patel, 25, who runs Roseland News in the town with his wife Priya, said yesterday's record jackpot led to exceptionally high demand for tickets.

'It's double or treble what we normally have, we've sold thousands,' he added. 'We've had the usual customers but we've also had people who'd never played before and needed to check how to do it, and we had to tell them.'

Romford resident Samantha Saunders- Jones, a 47-year-old mother of two, said: 'I got seven lucky dips, two for me and five for my son. If I won I'd buy myself a house ... and my sister runs her own business so I'd help her with that. 

Mehmet Altun, 44, owner of Priory News in Hornsey, North London, claimed it was the busiest day he had known for almost 20 years. 

It is possible the number of tickets sold for tomorrow's lottery will be an all-time high – topping 40million. 

Even statistician Sir David Spiegelhalter said he had already bought his ticket, despite the odds of winning the jackpot being raised to one in 45 million after the addition of ten extra balls last summer.  

Experts said there had never been a better chance to win, as new rules meant the jackpot had to be paid out even if no one managed to match all six numbers.

But they warned that the odds were still slim at 45 million to one – with bookies saying there was more chance of aliens landing on planet Earth, at a million to one.

The record-breaking prize swelled to £57.8 million after 14 rollovers, including Wednesday night's £50.4 million draw which had no winners.  

The new rules, which come into play when a jackpot passes £50 million, mean that in the next draw, a prize is shared between the next tier's winners – those who manage to match five numbers and the bonus ball.

It follows changes to the lottery's format after the number of balls in the draw increased from 49 to 59 in October, reducing the odds of winning from one in 14 million.  

• The largest jackpot in lottery history is up for grabs in the US tomorrow. The £462million ($675million) Powerball jackpot grew after no winner claimed Wednesday's jackpot draw worth a half-billion dollars.