I was the only one on my flight — it was like my own private jet

April 12, 2023

This was just plane awesome.

A UK man was flying to meet his family in Northern Ireland from Portugal on March 30 – but came to realize that he was the only passenger on the entire plane.

Paul Wilkinson, 65, first smelled something fishy when there was no line for his Jet2 flight at the airport gate.

He asked the airport staff if there was a problem with his flight, wondering if it had been delayed or canceled, but was surprised when they told him he would be the only person onboard, calling him a “VIP guest.”

“I thought they were having a laugh,” Wilkinson recalled to South West News Service.

“I thought I was early or late. I kept thinking they were going to say my flight had been canceled.”

Instead, he boarded the plane and was referred to as “King Paul” by the cabin crew throughout the flight.

Paul Wilkinson, 65, was on his way to Northern Ireland when he realized he was the only passenger on the entire plane.

He got to pick his own seat – choosing the front row, of course – and got to talk to the captain before the plane took off for Belfast.

“I think it was a total one off,” Wilkinson explained. “They’d taken holidaymakers to Portugal and there was no one to come back and it was pure luck that I needed to go to Belfast.”

Wilkinson had left his golfing vacation in Portugal to attend a funeral.

The dad of three compared the experience to being on a private plane.

“Someone told me a private jet is in the region of £28,000 [$34,954] and it’ll probably never happen again,” he said.

He likened the experience to being on his own private plane.

Wilkinson soaked up every moment, telling SWNS that the cabin crew were smiling and that the service he received on the flight was “second to none.”

He got to have a one-on-one safety demonstration, and they even took pictures of the experience.

“I jokingly asked for a refund on my seat, which I paid for,” Wilkinson said. “It was just surreal. I went for a walk around the plane, I had a pick of the toilets.”

When he got off the flight, he was also lucky enough to skip the lines at both passport control and baggage claim. He explained that the people working at the passport control couldn’t believe that he was the only one on the plane.

Since he was the only one on the plane, his bag was the only one on the carousel, too.

A spokesperson for Jet2 told SWNS, “We are delighted that Mr Wilkinson was able to experience our award-winning customer service in true VIP style.”

The father might have been the one in his family who got the last laugh, too – his wife, Deborah, ended up on an extremely cramped flight on her way to Belfast.

And the best part of all?

The three-hour flight only cost him $162.

“It was superb, they were at my beck and call, I’m spoilt now,” he said.

“Next time I’ll be asking how many people are on the plane.”