6 of the Luckiest People in the World

Luck works in mysterious ways. It can come to you when you least expect it and have life-changing effects, though there’s no telling when it may strike.

Some very fortunate people have experienced luck so extreme that you may find their stories hard to believe. Here’s a look at 6 of the luckiest people ever and what good fortune befell them.

Two Lucky Escapes

Maarten de Jonge is a Dutch professional racing cyclist. He makes the list because in 2014, he very luckily avoided being on two disastrous flights.

He claims to have been booked to go on the Malaysia Airlines Flight 370 - this is the flight that disappeared on 8 March en route from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing. At the last minute, he rescheduled and boarded a different plane.

He was also meant to fly on the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 that got shot down while in flight over eastern Ukraine. Everyone on board was killed. Maarten was going to be on this flight, but he found a cheaper option and changed his ticket.

The Jackpot Winner to be Jealous of

Here at LuckyStar Casino, we’ve got loads of thrilling progressive jackpot slots. Whether you’re playing online or at a land-based casino, the chances of winning a progressive jackpot is very slim indeed, especially if it’s one of the bigger ones.

Enter Elmer Sherwin. He played a Megabucks progressive jackpot slot machine in 1989 and won a cool $4.6 million, defying odds of less than 1 in 10 million. Winning such an unlikely prize once wasn’t enough for him, since he won the top Megabucks prize again 16 years later. His second win was for a staggering $21.1 million!

The Lottery Winner Who Kept on Winning

If you think Elmer’s two progressive jackpot wins are impressive, wait till you hear about Joan R Ginther. The American won US state lotteries a total of four times from 1993 to 2010, collecting a total of $20.4 million in prize money.

During this very lucky time of her life, Joan lived in Texas and bought all of her lottery tickets in the state. In fact, two of her winning tickets were purchased from the very same convenience store in the city of Bishop.

Her most significant win, $10 million, was also her fourth and final one. Nowadays, the unbelievably lucky woman is said to be residing in Las Vegas where she enjoys her winnings.

Its been calculated that she defied odds of approximately 10 to the power of 42 in winning the lotteries four times.

The Man Who Kept Cheating Death

They say that cats have nine lives. Something similar can be said for Frane Selak, who managed to cheat death a total of seven times. The Croatian man had the following very lucky escapes:

• A train he was on flipped off the tracks and ended up in a freezing cold river. Bystanders ensured that Frane was able to survive
• On his first (and last) flight, the plane malfunctioned and ended up crashing. Frane ended up falling through one of the plane’s doors and landing on a haystack, sustaining minor injuries
• He was on a bus that skidded out of control and fell into a freezing cold river (sound familiar?). He managed to escape by swimming to the shore
• In 1970, he was involved in a car accident where the car caught fire
• Three years later, he managed to survive being in a car accident and just like the previous one, the vehicle he was in caught fire
• A few years later, he was hit by a bus
• His final near-death experience came in 1996 when he successfully managed to avoid a head-on collision with a truck on a mountain road. He wasn’t wearing a seatbelt and even falling 300 feet down a ravine didn’t kill him

It’s safe to say Frane has had more than his fair share of luck. But, to top it all off, he went and won a lottery! Yes, as well as escaping death seven times, he scooped a €900,000 prize. Someone up there must really like him!

The Woman Whose Patience Paid Off

Back in 1995, Swedish woman Lena Pahlsson was distraught when she lost her wedding ring. She and her husband searched everywhere for it but were unable to locate it.

Fast forward 16 years and something quite remarkable happened. Lena and her family had a garden where they would grow carrots among other things. They would usually grow the carrots in rows, but had recently decided to scatter the seeds across the soil at random instead.

When pulling up the carrots, one of them had Lena’s lost wedding ring on it. The decision to scatter the seeds had resulted in the ring being recovered after 16 years. Lena, her husband and her family were amazed by what had happened and thrilled that the long-lost ring had been found.

Tsutomu Yamaguchi

Rounding off our list is Tsoutomu Yamaguchi, a Japanese man who’s credited with having survived two particularly calamitous events. He was a marine engineer and was in Hiroshima on 6 August 1945 when the Hiroshima atomic bomb was detonated.

He returned to his home town of Nagasaki the following day and went back to work on 9 August. This was the day of the Nagasaki bombing.

Thankfully, Tsutomu managed to live a full life, reaching the age of 90 before passing away.