It’s that string of futility that has enabled Powerball’s top prize to reach $1.23 billion, the 8th largest in U.S. lottery history. And it’s a sign that the game is operating exactly as designed, with long odds creating a massive jackpot that entices people to drop $2 on a ticket.

It means no one should ever expect to match all six numbers and hit it rich, though it’s likely someone eventually will.

The last time someone won the Powerball jackpot was on New Year’s Day, when a player in Michigan hit an $842.4 million jackpot.

Since then, there have been 40 consecutive drawings without a jackpot winner. The 41st on Saturday night will match the record for most drawings, set twice before in 2022 and 2021.

The winless streak isn’t a fluke. Lottery officials set the odds at 1 in 292.2 million in hopes that jackpots will roll over with each of the three weekly drawings until the top prize becomes so enormous that more people take notice and play.

The odds used to be significantly better, at 1 in 175 million, but were made tougher in 2015 to create the humongous jackpots. Lottery officials at that time also made it easier to win smaller prizes, and they note that the overall odds of winning something are about 1 in 25.

It’s hard to envision what odds of 1 in 292.2 million mean.

One way is to think of the roughly 322 million people who live in spots where they can buy Powerball tickets — five states don’t participate. If each person bought one ticket, you would expect one person to win and hundreds of millions of people to lose.

Put another way, the odds of winning the jackpot are a little worse than flipping a coin and getting heads 28 straight times, according to Andrew Swift, a University of Nebraska-Omaha mathematics professor.

Of all the people who bought lottery tickets for the last drawing Wednesday night, only 22.6% of the 292.2 million possible number combinations were covered, according to the Multi-State Lottery Association. That means that 77.4% of number combinations were not covered, and it’s an indication of why people so rarely win a jackpot.

Remember, the odds of an individual ticket winning never changes, but as more people play, more number combinations will be covered and the odds of someone winning rise.

And as bad as Powerball odds are, they’re a little better than Mega Millions, the other nearly national lottery game, which has jackpot odds of 1 in 302.6 million. And, to be fair, someone won a $1.13 billion Mega Millions prize last month.

Without a doubt, the Powerball jackpot is an incredible amount of money, but it’s also less than you might expect.

That’s because while officials tout the $1.23 billion prize, that is for a sole winner who chooses to be paid through an annuity, with an immediate payment and then annual payments over 29 years. Winners almost always opt for cash, which for Saturday night’s drawing would be an estimated $595.1 million.

Regardless of the payment option, a big chunk of the winnings would go toward taxes, though that amount would vary depending on winners’ other assets and whether their state taxes lottery winnings. Just note that the top federal tax income tax rate is 37%, meaning a lot of the winnings would go to Washington.

With an estimated $1.1 billion Mega Millions prize and an estimated $800 million Powerball jackpot, it’s the first time the two nearly national lottery games have each grown so large at the same time.

Both massive prizes are the results of months without a big winner, but the larger jackpots entice more people to play the games, increasing the chance that someone, somewhere, will finally hit it rich.

Up first is the Powerball drawing on Monday night, followed by Tuesday night’s Mega Millions drawing. If there isn’t a winner, the next chance to win Powerball will be Wednesday night and the next drawing for Mega Millions will be Friday night.

Lottery prizes have been larger than the current jackpots, but it’s the first time both games have offered top prizes of $800 million or more since the games were created decades ago.

The prizes have grown so big because it has been months since anyone has won a jackpot.

The last Mega Millions jackpot winner was on Dec. 8. Since then, there have been 30 consecutive drawings without a winner of the grand prize. No one has won the Powerball jackpot since Jan. 1, making for 35 consecutive drawings without a big winner of the game, which holds three weekly drawings.

The Mega Millions prize ranks as the 8th largest in U.S. lottery history and is about half the size of the largest jackpot, a $2.04 billion Powerball prize won in November 2022.

“There’s always an air of excitement around the country when the Mega Millions and Powerball jackpots soar simultaneously,” said Gretchen Corbin, president of the Georgia Lottery Corporation and lead director of the Mega Millions Consortium.

It’s no mystery why months have passed without a jackpot winner — the odds of snagging the big prizes are terrible.

For Mega Millions, the odds of matching all six numbers are 1 in 302.6 million. Powerball has slightly better odds of 1 in 292.2 million.

To put those odds in perspective, lottery officials note that after a win when jackpots reset at $20 million, total ticket sales typically cover less than 10% of all the possible number combinations. As jackpots climb to $1 billion or more, sales increase dramatically but still usually cover only about half of the possible combinations.

That means, there is still a good chance no one will hit a jackpot.

Of course, millions or people do win smaller prizes that range from $2 to $2 million. Players of both games have about a 1 in 4 chance of winning some kind of prize.

And remember, regardless of how large jackpots grow, the odds of an individual ticket winning never changes.

As massive as the jackpots are, winners should brace for much smaller payoffs than the figures advertised on billboards.

That’s because the state lotteries that run the games promote the total payoff if the prize is paid through an annuity over 30 years. That figure is now roughly double the cash prize, which nearly all winners choose because they want to invest the money themselves rather than opt for a defined payout.

For Mega Millions, that means the $1.1 billion jackpot actually would pay out an estimated $525.8 million cash prize. For Powerball, the $800 million annuity prize would mean an estimated $384.8 million cash prize.

Those prizes will be subject to federal taxes, and many states also tax lottery winnings. There also is a chance that multiple players will hit a jackpot, which would then be split between the winners.

Mega Millions is played in 45 states plus Washington, D.C., and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Powerball also is played in those states as well as Washington, D.C., the U.S. Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico.

The Mega Millions numbers are drawn at a TV studio in Atlanta and Powerball draws numbers at a Florida Lottery studio in Tallahassee.

Profits from the games fund state programs.

___

This story has been corrected to include that the Mega Millions jackpot is the 8th largest in U.S. history, not the 10th largest.

CONCORD, N.H. (AP) — Drenching rains, flooding and fierce winds stranded vehicles, shuttered schools and knocked out power to hundreds of thousands in the Northeast, the swan song of a bout of violent weather that battered most of the United States. Forecasters warned Wednesday that more misery was not far behind.

The storm hit the Northeast on Tuesday night and moved out Wednesday after toppling trees, downing power lines, and forcing water rescues on flooded or washed-out roads.

Wind gusts reached as high as 95 mph (153 kph) in Maine, and blustery weather continued Wednesday. Philadelphia, which sits on the Delaware River upstream from the Atlantic Ocean, experienced its highest storm surge on record.

Another storm could bring heavy rain and high winds to the Northeast from Friday night into Saturday, forecasters said.

The region’s woes followed a day of tornadoes and deadly accidents in the South and blizzards in the Midwest and Northwest. In some parts of the Pacific Northwest and the Rockies, more than 2 feet (about 75 centimeters) of snow fell. Bone-chilling cold promised to follow in some areas, and an avalanche in California killed at least one person as a new storm rolled in.

Hundreds of thousands of customers lost power at some point as storms swept the country. At least 250,000 customers remained without power Wednesday afternoon on both coasts and in parts of the Midwest, with New York and Pennsylvania leading the count, according to PowerOutage.us.

Nearly 700 flights were canceled across the country Wednesday, according to FlightAware.com.

The effects of the storm by region, and what’s still to come:

A couple of Pennsylvania communities got more than 4 inches (10 centimeters) of rain, and others came close. Emergency responders rescued some drivers as low-lying roads flooded.

In Lower Macungie, outside Allentown, a Mercedes remained in the middle of a now-dry two-lane road Wednesday afternoon, its owner having yet to retrieve it. An orange cone, a sign that rescuers had cleared the car, sat atop it. All told, first responders rescued four motorists in the bedroom community.

“It’s a common occurrence that when we have the heavy rains and the flooding occurs, and we shut down these roads, that some people choose to take their chances,” said Lower Macungie Fire Chief David Nosal. “And some make it through, some don’t, and those that don’t end up calling 911, and then we have to go out and retrieve them.”

The storm surge at Philadelphia was the highest in records dating to 1900, said Jeff Masters, a meteorologist with Yale Climate Connections. The storm flooded roads, uprooted trees and cut power.

The previous high surge came during Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

“Coastal flooding is accelerating and will continue to do so because sea level rise is accelerating, as well,” Masters said.

In New Jersey, roads flooded and rivers rose after some up to 3 inches (7.6 centimeters) of rain fell on ground already saturated by another storm a few weeks ago.

Lou DeFazio, 65, of Manville, lives steps from the Millstone River, which flooded disastrously in 2021 in the remnants of Hurricane Ida.

“It’s getting worse and worse,” he said as the river swelled Wednesday.

In New York’s Nassau County, on Long Island, cars sloshed through water in the streets of Freeport. Farther east, near the Hamptons, flooding was reported at Shinnecock Bay. Several schools across Long Island canceled or delayed classes.

New York City officials evacuated nearly 2,000 migrants housed at a sprawling tent complex in Brooklyn amid fears high winds could collapse it. Families slept on the floor of a high school. The migrants returned to the complex early Wednesday after winds eased.

Winds gusted to 95 mph (153 kph) at Maine’s Isle au Haut, an island in Penobscot Bay, said Jon Palmer, of the National Weather Service.

Winds pushed a parked but empty Southwest Airlines plane into a jet bridge early Wednesday at Portland International Jetport, Maine’s largest airport, officials said. No one was hurt, but a wing was damaged and a new aircraft was sent to operate the flight.

The storm canceled events and government functions in Maine, where some areas were still recovering from a snowstorm over the weekend and flooding the previous month. In a parking lot at a Portland wharf, lobstermen used pumps in an attempt to thwart floodwaters.

The storm caused severe coastal flooding at Hampton Beach, New Hampshire, with police discouraging people from getting too close to the surf. Hampton Beach’s Ocean Boulevard was temporarily closed, and residents were told to shelter in place as the surf crashed over sea walls.

Water surrounded entire neighborhoods and made roads impassable, and a shelter was set up in Hampton. No injuries were reported.

A dam breach in Connecticut brought evacuation orders along the Yantic River in Norwich. It was lifted hours later after the dam was deemed not in danger of failing. A power substation that had been shut down, cutting electricity to 5,000 customers, was being brought back online.

Later, another Connecticut dam — Pameacha Pond Dam in Middletown — experienced a partial breach as a result of flooding from Tuesday’s storm. The state Department of Public Works says no businesses or homes were affected.

In Vermont, winds gusted to 70 mph, and rain followed heavy, wet snow. Many schools closed or delayed classes.

The storm also hit Atlantic Canada with snow, rain, and high winds and waves, closing schools and cutting power to thousands in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Nova Scotia.

An avalanche at the Palisades Tahoe ski resort in California killed one person Wednesday and injured three others as a major storm with snow and wind gusts moved into the region, officials said. One The resort was the site of the 1960 Winter Olympics.

The storm is expected to bring as much as 2 feet (61 cm) of snow to the highest elevations in the Sierra Nevada by Thursday. The National Weather Service issued a rare snow squall warning as night fell Wednesday east of Reno, Nevada, with as much as 2 inches (5 cm) of snow per hour possible in some areas.

Storms in the Pacific Northwest and Rocky Mountains had already dumped 29 inches (74 centimeters) at Stevens Pass in Washington and 30 inches (76 centimeters) outside Santa Fe, New Mexico, according to the National Weather Service.

Authorities issued warnings for very dangerous avalanche conditions in mountainous areas of Idaho, Montana, Wyoming, Utah, Washington and Oregon. Backcountry travelers were advised to stay away from steep slopes.

In parts of northern Montana, temperatures could drop below minus 30 (minus 34 Celsius) by Saturday morning. High temperatures were expected to remain below freezing as far south as Oklahoma.

Slushy highways led to fatal collisions in Wisconsin and another in Michigan.

The storm, which began Monday, buried cities across the Midwest, stranding people on highways. Some areas saw up to a foot (30 centimeters) of snow on Monday, including Kansas, eastern Nebraska and South Dakota, western Iowa, and southwestern Minnesota.

Madison, Wisconsin, expected much as 9 inches (23 centimeters) of snow and 40 mph (64 kph) winds.

The weather has already affected campaigning for Iowa’s Jan. 15 precinct caucuses, where the snow is expected to be followed by frigid temperatures that could drift below zero degrees (minus 18 Celsius).

Forecasters warned of dangerous temperatures and windchills in the Midwest and Plains dipping to minus 20 (29 Celsius) or lower in Chicago, Kansas City and some areas of Montana.

Several deaths have been blamed on heavy rain, hail and wind, including possible tornadoes. Roofs were blown off homes, and furniture, fences and debris were strewn about.

An 81-year-old woman in Alabama was killed when her mobile home was tossed from its foundation by a suspected tornado. A man died south of Atlanta when a tree fell on his car. Another person died in North Carolina in a suspected tornado.

Some areas of Florida were cautioned about streams and rivers flooding Wednesday afternoon. Gov. Ron DeSantis issued a state of emergency for dozens of counties in North Florida.

Rescuers in Virginia pulled two people from floodwaters, where they clung to branches after their vehicle flooded and they were swept from its roof, according to Albemarle County Fire Rescue. They weren’t injured and were in the water for at least 10 minutes.

___

McFetridge reported from Des Moines, Iowa. Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Patrick Whittle and David Sharp in Portland, Maine; Michael Rubinkam and Jeff McMillan in northeastern Pennsylvania; Sarah Brumfield in Silver Spring, Maryland; Matthew Brown in Billings, Montana; and Dave Collins and Pat Eaton-Robb in Hartford, Connecticut.

A combination of all those factors means that unless there is a winner soon, the jackpot could top the record lottery prize of $2.04 billion won last November by a Powerball player in California.

HOW DID WE GET HERE?

Someone last won the Powerball jackpot July 19, and since then it has grown three times a week, with each drawing on Mondays, Wednesday and Saturdays without a winner. It started at $21 million on July 22 and after 33 straight drawings in which no one matched all six numbers drawn, it has reached $1.4 billion for Saturday night’s drawing.

MATH AND LUCK

That winless streak shouldn’t be a surprise because it shows the game is operating as it was designed. The immense jackpot odds of 1 in 292.2 million are intended to make winning rare so the grand prizes can grow so large. People may say they would be satisfied with winning a smaller sum, but it’s the giant jackpots that prompt people to drop a few dollars on a Powerball ticket at the mini mart.

When someone wins the big prize and the jackpot reverts to about $20 million, sales drop dramatically. Those sales then rise steadily along with the top prize.

For Wednesday night’s drawing, roughly 25% of the 292.2 million possible Powerball combinations were selected, according to the Multi-State Lottery Association. That was up from about 20% for the drawing Monday night. The lottery association forecasts that for Saturday night’s drawing, sales will increase enough that nearly 38% of number combinations will be covered — in part because Saturday sales usually are higher.

Of course, people can win when jackpots are relatively small, as the odds never change, but the fewer tickets purchased, the less likely there will be a winner.

TICKET BUYING

Plenty of people buy Powerball tickets, but sales are far less than seven or eight years ago, when jackpots began to grow much larger after a change in the game’s odds. Before the jackpot odds worsened in 2015 from 1 in 175.2 million to 1 in 292.2 million, more people won the top prizes, so they didn’t grow so massive.

Initially, the giant prizes attract giant sales. For example, on Jan. 13, 2016, when a Powerball prize reached $1.5 billion — a record then, but close to what’s up for grabs Saturday — sales were so high that 88.6% of possible number combinations were covered. That’s more than double the sales expected this Saturday.

Some of that reflects that Powerball drawings now are held three times a week, so overall sales are similar, but it still means that the chance someone will hit the jackpot is far less now than several years ago.

Alan Feldman, a distinguished fellow at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas’ International Gaming Institute, said that state lotteries have worked hard to keep their games lively but that it is inevitable some people will lose interest over time.

“Things go in and out of style,” Feldman said. “Everything gets a little stale.”

DON’T EXPECT A CHECK FOR $1.4 BILLION

Lotteries promote the $1.4 billion jackpot, but the prize everyone is dreaming of is less than half that amount — $614 million. That’s because the $1.4 billion prize is for a sole winner who is paid over 30 years through an annuity, in which the $614 million cash prize is invested and pays more over time.

As interest rates have risen in the past year, the cash prize has generated much larger annuity prizes. Winners rarely take the annuity option, but that’s the big number that is displayed on lottery billboards.

As Drew Svitko, the Pennsylvania Lottery’s executive director, put it last fall, “We use investments to fund the annuity to pay that prize, so the investments rely on interest, and the degree to which interest rates affect the value of those investments also affect that jackpot.”

Police say the suspect in the killings of two Des Moines area police officers is in custody.

Des Moines police Sgt. Paul Parizek says Scott Michael Greene was taken into custody without incident Wednesday morning.

Greene is suspected in the killing of a Des Moines police officer and an Urbandale police officer earlier Wednesday.

___

EARLIER:

DES MOINES, Iowa

Two Des Moines area police officers were shot to death early Wednesday in separate ambush-style attacks while they were sitting in their patrol cars, and police said they are searching for a known suspect.

Officers responded to a report of shots fired at 1:06 a.m. and found an Urbandale Police Department officer who had been shot. Authorities from several agencies saturated the area after that shooting, and about 20 minutes later discovered that a Des Moines officer had been shot in a patrol car at an intersection, Des Moines Sgt. Paul Parizek said. The shootings happened less than 2 miles apart and both took place along main streets that cut through residential areas.

“There’s somebody out there shooting police officers. We hope to find him before somebody else gets hurt,” said Parizek, who stopped briefly during a news conference as he worked to control his emotions.

The shootings follow a spate of police killings, including ambushes of officers in Dallas and Baton Rouge, Louisiana. Five officers were killed in Dallas on July 7 and three were killed later that month in Baton Rouge.

Des Moines and Urbandale Police later said in a statement that they have identified 46-year-old Scott Michael Greene as a suspect in the killings, describing him as armed and dangerous and urging members of the public to not approach him.

Police described Greene, of Urbandale, as white, 5′ 11″ and 180 lbs with brown hair and green eyes, last known to be driving a blue 2011 Ford F-150 with Iowa license plate 780 YFR. Police did not explain how they identified Greene as a suspect.

“There is a clear and present danger to police officers,” Parizek said. He said officers are now conducting patrols in pairs for protection.

Urbandale Sgt. Chad Underwood said he believes this is the first time an officer in his department has been shot in the line of duty.

Urbandale officers are equipped with body cameras, but they don’t run constantly and it’s unclear whether there was video of the shootings.

The attacks on police this summer in Dallas and Baton Rouge came in the wake of several high-profile police shootings of black men, fueling a national debate about police use of force, especially against minorities — a frequent topic in the nation’s presidential race.

Republican nominee Donald Trump has argued that police need the freedom to use greater force, while Democrat Hillary Clinton has taken a more nuanced position of supporting officers while also calling for restraint when dealing with minority communities. The most divisive general election in memory is just six days away.

Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad called the killings Wednesday, “an attack on the public safety of all Iowans.”

“We call on Iowans to support our law enforcement officials in bringing this suspect to justice. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the police officers who were tragically killed in the line of duty as well as the officers who continue to put themselves in harm’s way.”

Urbandale is a suburb of about 40,000 people in the Des Moines metro area with about 50 officers. Officials in Urbandale cancelled school for the day. Des Moines has about 375 sworn officers.

The Powerball jackpot has reached $900 million just hours before Saturday night’s drawing.

With sales breaking previous records, the odds are growing that someone will win. But if no one matches all the numbers, the next drawing is expected to soar to $1.3 billion, according to officials with the Multi-State Lottery Association, which runs the Powerball game.

“You can throw out the logic. You can throw out the statistics,” Gary Grief, executive director of the Texas Lottery, said Friday. “We’ve never seen jackpots like this. It’s a new experience for all of us.”

Since Nov. 4, the Powerball jackpot has grown from its $40 million starting point as no one has won the jackpot. This kind of huge jackpot was just what lottery officials hoped for last fall when they changed the odds of matching all the Powerball numbers, from about one in 175 million to one in 292.2 million. By making it harder to win a jackpot, the tougher odds made the ever-larger prizes inevitable.

The bigger prizes draw more players, who in turn make the jackpots even bigger.

So many people were buying Powerball tickets in Iowa on Friday that lottery spokeswoman Mary Neubauer said some stores were running out of paper for tickets, leaving lottery workers scrambling to resupply the outlets.

The odds are a matter of statistics and probability, but they’re facts that most players may not completely understand, said Ron Wasserstein, executive director of the Alexandria, Virginia-based American Statistical Association.

“Once you get numbers that size, it’s hard for people to wrap their minds around them,” Wasserstein said.

It’s not like players ever had a great shot at winning a jackpot, but by lengthening the odds, he said, “you take odds that were really, really small before, and now they’re nearly twice as small as they were before.”

Players in Lincoln, Nebraska, said they don’t expect to win, but most noted that eventually, someone will take home all that money.

Gary Diaz of Lincoln said he’s bought one or two Powerball tickets every week since a group of his co-workers won a lottery jackpot in 2004.

“Ever since then, I go, hell, if it happened once, it’s gotta happen again,” Diaz said. “It’s all by chance.”

Bashir Rahman, a chef from Moscow, Idaho, who was traveling through Nebraska, said he decided to buy a couple tickets at a Casey’s gas station in Lincoln, but he realizes it’s a long, long shot.

“You buy more than two, you’re just stupid,” he said.

Wasserstein said he understands why so many people buy Powerball tickets, calling it a small price for a chance to dream of immense riches. But Wasserstein said he and his colleagues know too well the nearly impossible odds to plunk down even $2 for a ticket.

“I can assure you,” he said, “there is no office pool for the lottery at the American Statistical Association.”

___

Associated Press writer Anna Gronewold in Lincoln, Nebraska, contributed to this report.