A lad was in for a surprise recently when he boarded a flight in Edinburgh to find it was completely empty. Check out the deserted aircraft here:
Normally, when you jet off for a holiday you pray it's sparsely populated so you can spread out a bit - or sit next to your partner who refused to fork out extra for seat selection.
But Jak Scott clambered aboard his Jet2 flight to Skiathos, Greece, last Friday (30 September) to find that only he and two other passengers would be making the trip.
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This obviously doesn't seem like a great way to run a business - or a planet, for that matter - so naturally Jak was taken aback by the discovery that he would essentially be flying to Greece on a private jet.
He said: "With today's rising costs etc I was pretty shocked when I got on my flight to Greece on Friday as it was only myself and two other passengers onboard.
"I got to the gate early was confused why no one else was going through, it wasn't until they did the final call I got up and went to the desk, and the service agent walked me to the aeroplane door and told me it's only me and two other people.
"I thought it was some sort of strange joke until I entered the plane."
He added: "I travel regularly and have heard about this a couple of times before but this is the first time I've ever experienced a flight so empty myself.
"I got served pretty much after the seat belt sign went off after take off.
"Staff mentioned it could have been to do with holidays but I find it really bizarre though as the ticket was only £59."
Jet2 has since offered up an explanation as to why he basically got to fly solo.
"Jak got to experience our VIP customer service in true style," a Jet2 spokesperson told LADbible.
"As it was our last Edinburgh to Skiathos flight of the summer season, the aircraft departed with way fewer customers than normal but returned to Edinburgh with lots of holidaymakers making their way home after a fantastic holiday."
It comes after the Guardian reported that more than 5,000 completely empty passenger flights have flown to or from the UK since 2019, with a further 35,000 commercial flights operating almost empty, with fewer than 10 percent of seats filled.
The findings of the analysis of data from the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) was branded 'shocking' by climate campaigners.
"Publication of this data is a step in the right direction, but we need more transparency to understand why these inefficient, polluting practices continue, and to hold the main airline culprits to account," Tim Johnson, of the Aviation Environment Federation, told The Guardian.
"Given the climate emergency, the revelation that so many near empty planes have been burning fossil fuels and adding to the CO2 building up in the atmosphere is pretty shocking."
Jake Massey