potatochip
It has happened before as people have posted pictures. It is very rare and usually due to bad weather and the other passengers being re-booked on other flights, but the plane needs to be at that location because there are passengers waiting at that airport. There was a story once of an American Airlines flight that left from New York to London Heathrow with only 5 people on board.
Jennifer
Yes.It doesn't happen that often but it does happen. In fact it happened recently.
https://thepointsguy.com/2017/10/passenger-gets-private-flight-to-greece/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/travel/travel_news/article-3658063/A-private-jet-price-economy-ticket-Man-shocked-discover-passenger-flight-New-Orleans-Atlanta.html
https://nypost.com/2018/01/04/luckiest-passenger-ever-gets-entire-plane-to-herself/
Anonymous
Private plane, YES.
Commercial plane, it will Never happen
Anonymous
depends on the situation but it happens more than you think. Not necessarily one passenger but anything less than a profitable flight is subject to cancellation. Airplanes fly a certain route so it needs to be somewhere else. A lot of seasonal routes have this issue at the beginning or end of the season. the outbound flight might have only a few people but the return flight might be fully booked so that plane has to be there..
Now, if it's between two cities that the airline has several flights a day, they may cancel an empty flight if it doesn't have to be somewhere else. But again, lot of factors. A small airline with limited aircraft would probably have to run the flight because they have a full a schedule. Routes that are out and back and only serviced once per day will have to go no matter what because there's actually two flights and they won't cancel unless they have no choice. Also, certain routes can only use certain aircraft so might not have any choice.
This is also called repositioning, moving a plane to another city that has a live load
Ageof
Yes. All airports have an orderly schedule. Even if nobody has purchased a ticket for that plane and there are no passengers the plane will fly to its assigned destination at its assigned time regardless.