As the clock ticks down to a critical midnight deadline on 28 October 2025, the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation (OLG) is issuing a final public appeal to the unknown holder of a winning Lotto Max ticket worth C$40 million (£21.4 million), warning that the life-changing sum will be permanently forfeited if no rightful claimant steps forward before the cutoff. The jackpot-winning slip was purchased exactly one year prior at a retail outlet in Grey County, Ontario, a scenic tourist region that encompasses popular destinations including the Blue Mountains and the city of Owen Sound. OLG officials note that a large share of ticket buyers in the area are out-of-town visitors, who may have stowed the ticket in a pocket, luggage or personal belongings and completely forgotten to verify its status after returning home. Media relations coordinator for OLG, Tony Bitonti, emphasized in a statement to CTV News that the most disheartening detail of the ongoing search is that the winning ticket has never been scanned either via the official OLG mobile app or at any authorized retail lottery terminal across the province. The official winning number sequence for the unclaimed jackpot is 06, 14, 17, 19, 26, 43, 45, with a designated Bonus Number of 27. OLG representatives have urged all local residents and recent visitors to Grey County to conduct a thorough search of common storage spots for forgotten tickets, including jacket pockets, handbags, backpacks, wallets, and vehicle glove compartments. If the deadline passes without a valid claim, the full C$40 million sum will be reallocated to fund future prize pools for provincial lottery games. This is not the first time a massive Ontario Lotto Max prize has gone unclaimed: in June 2022, a C$70 million jackpot won by a ticket sold in Scarborough lapsed permanently, even after more than 2,700 members of the public reached out to OLG to inquire about the unclaimed prize with no valid claimant ever coming forward. Data from Atlantic Lottery, a separate provincial government-run lottery operator, shows that roughly 1% of all lottery prizes across Canada go unclaimed in a typical year, the vast majority of which are small, low-value sums. The urgent appeal for the C$40 million unclaimed jackpot comes on the heels of a separate historic lottery win in Alberta last week, where a lucky resident claimed the largest single lottery prize in Canadian history, a C$90 million sum, and has not yet chosen to reveal their identity publicly.