LOUISVILLE, KY. – In July 2003, Amanda Young said goodbye to her father as he left for Iraq to work for a contractor and help the family out of debt. Now Charles Craig Young is heading home, since the family won $100,000 Wednesday night playing Powerball (search).
They matched five numbers, 5-6-19-44-50, but missed on the Powerball, 28.
"We're just glad he can finally come home," said Amanda Young, of Flatwood. "We're just relieved to get him out of there."
Judy and Amanda Young got the news Wednesday night and realized the implications immediately for her father, Amanda Young said.
"It was probably 10 or 15 minutes of screaming," she said.
A short time later, Charles Craig Young called from Iraq and got the news.
"He really didn't believe us at first," Amanda Young said.
Her father supervises maintenance crews in the heavily fortified Green Zone of Baghdad for Iraqi dignitaries. He works for private contractor KBR (search), Houston-based Halliburton's (search) engineering and construction subsidiary. He was originally due back in August, but stayed to make extra money.
"They were kind of undecided when he was going to come home," Amanda Young said. "We kind of solved that problem."
Not all the money will go toward debt, Judy Young said. Her husband has one request when he gets back to Kentucky — he wants a new tractor.
Judy Young e-mailed the supervisor at the Amazon.com warehouse in Huntington, W.Va., where she works as a senior customer service associate. The message said she wouldn't be at work Thursday.
"I think he'll be OK with it, since I said I would do something special for the whole team next week," she said.
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