scottienz69

I used miles to upgrade from Y to J on EK419 last week between SYD and BKK. Having checked EF before departing NZ I knew that loads were light, but was still surprised to find that there were only 20-odd pax on the entire upper deck of an old A380, and that I had the entire smaller back cabin of business all to myself! The crew were great - no surprise there given the light loading - and several pax hung out in the bar for large parts of the flight.

I was just curious to find out if anyone else has had a similar experience of having an almost empty premium (or economy) cabin all to themselves?

skywardhunter

I've had the rear J cabin of the A380 completely to myself before, I've been in F with just 1 other pax, but that's not that unusual. I've been in Y on a 77W with the total Y load being just 50 pax, (average of 6 seats per pax).

Different airline but on MS (EgyptAir) I've had just one other pax in a 16-seat J cabin before.

scottienz69

The Purser told me that there were just 17 pax in J - I think he said there were only 4 in F - I stuck with 23K in the rear J cabin as I like to sleep on my right side facing the window.

dagohh

I had a very similar flight to FRA last year, 17 pax in J, 1 of those in the rear cabin (me), also 23K
They were expecting a full return though.

thijsseh

Although not on EK and certainly not on a 'wide body', I have once been the only passenger on a commercial flight. This was in the 1970's from LGA to Allentown (can't remember the code). It was a 12 seater, leaving from gate 31a (or something like that). I found gate 31 and 32, but no indication of 31a. I asked around and was told to sit on a chair next to an unmarked door. A man in airline uniform appeared from the door and asked me if I was a passenger for Allentown. I confirmed this and he asked me to come with him. It turned out he was the pilot. The co-pilot appeared, carrying my checked bag. I took a seat, the pilot turned around and gave me the safety briefing (no divider between 'cockpit' and 'cabin') and we were off. After a short flight, we arrived in Allentown and the process was reversed: Pilot escorted me to the gate, co pilot carried the bag. After quite a long walk I arrived at the luggage carroussel where my bag was going round by itself.
After having taken the JFK-LGA helicopter shuttle earlier, this was quit a trip for a 20odd year old...

m3red

ioto1902

It happened to me only once, in June 2016 on a A330 (one of the last ones). All 12 seats for myself ...
But, this is not as pleasant as an empty Y cabin, where you can lie down across 4 seats while you were expecting to be blocked by two bodybuilders during 10+ hours.
The most you can do is to flatten another seat to have an independent bed, as we used to have on LH B747.

The biggest advantage of an empty cabin is that you can have as many dishes / drinks as you want :-) .

lots@LHR

My wife and I flew EK F for the first time BKK-DXB-DUB a few years ago. BKK-DXB we ate in the lounge and showered on board and slept. The cabin was full and we landed in DXB before dozens of flights got affected by fog. When we boarded DXB-DUB all other passengers were no shows due to misconnections. So we had EK F on the 777 to ourselves. We tried to eat and drink everything!

dingobingo

My partner and I almost had Y upper deck to ourselves recently BKK to DXB. Just two others. CC invited a few lower deck folks to join us, but there were still only 8 of us. Our connecting DXB to LHR was packed to the rafters and we were back downstairs again due to no upper Y.

Flame3601

JTXC

I have been alone in F a few times: once SFO-DXB once DXB-AMS, and once AMM-DXB. I felt self-conscious being alone.

XXTSGR

"Only" a B777 but on EK768 today there's just one pax in F 😀

m3red

Flame3601

EK768 is always the more "emptier" flight out of the 4 from JNB in my experience, even more so now that everyone prefers to get on the A380 service out of JNB these days.

XXTSGR