Italian Man Throws Away Million-Euro Winning Lottery Ticket in Misunderstanding

An Italian man who mistakenly discarded a winning scratch card worth one million euro sparked a desperate race against time for sanitation workers to recover it from the trash.

The Mistaken Disposal

A man who had participated in instant lotteries for years using numbers related to a loved one finally hit a five-number combination worth one million euro, but he did not realize it at first. According to lottery rules, points of sale pay out winnings only for small amounts, and the phrase not subject to payment led the player to believe he had lost, causing him to leave the ticket behind.

When the man returned home, his family members pointed out that the numbers he had indicated were winners, making him realize what had happened. He and his family rushed back to the point of sale, where staff had thrown the ticket into the trash.

The Race Against Time

An employee of Sanb, a company handling waste collection and transport, had already picked up the garbage, prompting a race against time to recover the ticket. Company director Roberto Nicola Toscano explained to the ANSA agency that the firm retraced the vehicle’s entire route and sorted the waste to locate the lost item.

The Recovery in the Sort Facility

Efforts succeeded on Tuesday, August 4, at 5:30 AM, when a sorting facility employee found the lost ticket inside a punctured bag alongside other slips. Unlike most others, the winner’s proof remained intact, and Toscano told ANSA that touching it brought good luck since the man subsequently bought a scratch card winning 50 euro.

Previous Assistance with Discarded Valuables

This is not the first time the enterprise has fulfilled an unusual request. According to reports from La Repubblica on October 23, 2025, a family from Bitonto asked for help finding accidentally discarded banknotes totaling 400 euro, leading workers to dismantle a garbage truck to successfully retrieve them.