Virgin's New Middle Seat Lottery Is Giving Prizes to Folks Stuck in Everyone's Least-Favourite Spot

No one likes the middle seat on a plane. Does anyone book flights, select where to sit and genuinely (and willingly) pick being stuck between two other people, with no window to look out and no easy access to the aisle, if there's another option? No, no they don't. Until now, that is, because Virgin Australia has just started throwing some love towards folks who do indeed take everyone's least-favourite spot — via a new Middle Seat Lottery.

Running since Monday, October 24, and showering people sitting in the middle with prizes until Sunday, April 23, 2023, the Middle Seat Lottery is as self-explanatory as it sounds. Plonk yourself down in the abhorred seat — with a ticket, of course — and you could score goodies for your trouble. The freebies change each week, but there's more than $230,000 in prizes on offer across the six-month competition — only if you either select the middle seat or you're assigned it.

Those prizes include Caribbean cruises with Virgin Voyages, complete with flights to and from the USA; a helicopter pub crawl in Darwin, again with flights there and back included; and a Cairns adventure package, which covers flights, accommodation, bungy jumping, river rafting and other activities

There's also flights and tickets to your AFL team's away games in 2023 — and, still on Aussie rules, an AFL Grand Final package, covering a lunch, tickets to the game, being on the boundary line before the match, merch and an after party.

One prize will be given out each week, with 26 prizes in total across the competition's duration. And if your week doesn't coincide with a holiday giveaway, platinum Velocity Frequent Flyer status with one million points is also on the freebies list.

An hour or so in a seat you wouldn't normally pick for the chance to win holidays, heaps of footy or frequent flyer points to book more holidays? Worth it, probably.

To go in the running to win any of the above, you do need to be a Velocity Frequent Flyer member over the age of 18. And, you'll have to fly somewhere within Australia, on a Virgin Australia-operated domestic flight, during the competition period — in a middle seat, obviously.

Also, to enter, you then need to use the Virgin Australia app within 48 hours of your flight's scheduled departure time, tapping on the Middle Seat Lottery tile, finding your flight and entering your details.

From there, winners will be drawn each week and contacted if they're successful.

Virgin Australia's Middle Seat Lottery runs from Monday, October 24, 2022–Sunday, April 23, 2023. For more information, head to the Virgin website.

Images: Carly Ravenhall.

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