National Lottery Lotto Draw Halted by Technical Fault During £10.5M Jackpot Event

The National Lottery's Lotto draw, with a jackpot of £10.5 million, was interrupted due to a technical fault when the bonus ball failed to drop, causing the live stream to halt abruptly. The operator, Allwyn, which took over from Camelot in 2024, paused the draw and announced it would resume the draw on a new machine under the supervision of an independent adjudicator. The cause of the glitch remains unknown, and the usual YouTube live stream was unavailable during the incident. Despite the disruption, the Thunderball draw occurred around 20 minutes late, while Allwyn apologized for the delay and promised to publish the verified results later the same evening. This incident follows a recent tech upgrade by Allwyn, which included substantial investments in the lottery's systems, yet the fault raised questions about the reliability of the new infrastructure. The event also mirrored a similar technical issue with EuroMillions earlier in October, highlighting ongoing challenges with live lottery broadcasts.