Just eight weeks after Florida's $55.1 million jackpot eclipsed lottomania in California, the Golden State is back with a $55 million-plus jackpot that will be North America's richest ever. Lottery officials and merchants said ticket sales for Saturday's drawing already were double what an average Thursday would rake in. The official estimate of ``over $55 million'' for the drawing is conservative, based on previous betting patterns in the two-year history of California's computerized lottery game, said lottery spokesman Bob Taylor. ``Over $55 million'' could mean several million dollars over, officials acknowledge. It all depends on how wildly Californians react to the 1-in-14-million chance of winning the jackpot, which would be paid in an annuity of at least $2.75 million before taxes for 20 years, for the cost of a $1 lotto ticket. The size of the jackpot depends on sales and jackpot rollovers, which fuel each other to produce the heavy gambling periods dubbed lottomania. When no one picks all six winning numbers out of a choice of 49 numbers, the jackpot is rolled over, or added, to the top prize for the next twice-weekly drawing. Four rollovers, including a $33.4 million jackpot Wednesday night, produced the current record prize estimate. The exact size of the jackpot depends on how many tickets are sold. Twenty cents of every $1 ticket feeds the jackpot. The California lottery produced a $51.4 million jackpot, North America's largest at the time, in June. It was evenly split between two players, an aircraft mechanic and a supermarket clerk. That record was eclipsed Sept. 3 by a $55.1 million prize in Florida that went to a 63-year-old real estate broker.
