A 79-year-old grandmother in Germany rescued a fortune from oblivion after she realised a lottery ticket she had thrown in the bin was worth more than 13.7 million euros ($18.02 million).

"She searched and searched, turned the house upside down, but couldn't find the ticket," said Elmar Bamfaste, a spokesman for the WestLotto lottery in northwestern Germany. "Finally, she looked in the rubbish bin, and there it was. She was lucky."

Bamfaste said the woman copied the winning numbers from her horoscope in a magazine, and then forgot about the ticket. She later threw away both the magazine and the ticket.

After WestLotto launched a media campaign to find the winner on Monday, the resident of the Bergisches Land region in western Germany realised she had hit the jackpot.

Three days later, she found the 11.75 euro ticket that netted her the 8th highest lottery win in German history.

"She said she's looking forward to life as a rich grandma," Bamfaste said of the woman, who lives in a rented flat.