{"id":15081,"date":"2024-08-07T20:57:34","date_gmt":"2024-08-07T20:57:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.historydefined.net\/?p=15081"},"modified":"2024-08-07T22:15:59","modified_gmt":"2024-08-07T22:15:59","slug":"how-the-luckiest-man-alive-won-the-lottery-twice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.historydefined.net\/how-the-luckiest-man-alive-won-the-lottery-twice\/","title":{"rendered":"How “the luckiest man alive” won the lottery twice"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

In 1998, Australian Bill Morgan\u2019s life hung in the balance. Following a car crash that hospitalized him, he also endured a catastrophic heart attack that left doctors declaring him \u201cclinically dead\u201d when his heart stopped beating. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Despite regaining a heartbeat after more than 14 minutes, doctors said he would still not recover. Morgan drifted into a coma with no signs of coming out of it.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

After two weeks of no movement, all hope seemed lost. Arrangements were already being made for his funeral. But the 37-year-old Morgan stunned everyone when he woke up from his coma, an awakening those at the hospital cited as a \u201cmedical miracle.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But that was just the start of Morgan\u2019s victory over the odds. A year later, Morgan won a scratch-off lottery not once but twice, the second time coming on live television when it was supposed to be filmed for re-enactment purposes only. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Morgan\u2019s victory over death and the incredible surge of luck left many to dub him \u201cThe luckiest man in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bill Morgan reacts to winning the lottery live on TV.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Morgan\u2019s Battle With Death<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

For Bill Morgan, life was not easy before his 38th birthday. He was a truck driver in Australia who lived out of his caravan in a park with his wife, trying to survive paycheck to paycheck.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was one thing for Morgan to fight for money; it was another thing to battle with his life. A bad car crash not only left him severely injured but worsened his heart condition. When the doctors at the hospital gave him medicine to try to improve his health, Morgan suffered an allergic reaction leading to a horrific heart attack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Doctors tried to revive him, and for 14 minutes and 38 seconds, Morgan\u2019s heart had stopped and his family was told the hospital was about to take him off of life support. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Just when they were ready to pull the plug and officially list him as deceased, Morgan\u2019s heart slowly started beating again. Morgan wasn\u2019t out of the woods, though, and doctors were still on the verge of giving up hope.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI went into a coma and Dandenong Hospital said they were turning off the machine,\u201d Morgan said. \u201cEven if I came to I was going to be brain dead and a vegetable for all my life. My sisters didn’t want them to turn it off, and there was a specialist from the Alfred Hospital who said, \u2018We’ll take him but we want to use him as a guinea pig essentially and try different things, if one of them works, great.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Well, one of those experiments did work. After 15 days in a coma, Morgan miraculously defied the odds and woke up. He slowly recovered while still being diagnosed with severe heart issues. Thankful to be alive and considering himself lucky, Morgan played daily scratch-offs figuring he had nothing to lose.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lottery Luck<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Morgan went a year buying a Tattslotto and a $5 scratchie ticket, hoping to break the bank. For 12 months, he barely won anything. But then, out of nowhere, he won a new Toyota Corolla worth $30,000. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When the media discovered Morgan\u2019s car winning, they wanted to re-enact and put it on the news. So they called Morgan and asked if he could come down to the same place he bought the ticket and pretend he won for television purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt wasn’t that big of a deal to me until the newspapers and TV stations got wind of it,\u201d Morgan said. \u201cThey thought it was a good luck story, so that’s how it all started. And I went into the news agent’s and they filmed me walking up to the counter to get a $5 Scratchie and one of the cameramen said, \u2018That’d make a good shot, we’ll get you scratching it off.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, the odds of Morgan winning thousands of dollars on this \u201cpretend scratch-off\u201d was more than 1 million-to-one. But as he scratched off his ticket with the cameras rolling, Morgan noticed something instantly about this ticket. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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