A line of 100 airline passengers is waiting to board a plane. They each hold a ticket to one of the 100 seats on that flight. For convenience, let's say that the nth passenger in line has a ticket for the seat number 'n'. Being drunk, the first person in line picks a random seat (equally likely for each seat). All of the other passengers are sober, and will go to their proper seats unless it is already occupied; If it is occupied, they will then find a free seat to sit in, at random.
What is the probability that the last (100th) person to board the plane will sit in their proper seat (#100)?
HintCan last passenger arrive at any other seat than 1 or 100?
Answer
Solution
Notice that the last passenger can only take seat #1 or #100. If any passenger takes seat #1, the cycle stops, and all the subsequent passengers take their own seats (including last). Otherwise, if #100 seat is taken before #1, the cycle is paused, i.e., the subsequent passengers do take their own seats, but the last passenger would take seat #1. Now for any passenger from 1st to 99th, who is picking random vacancy, will choose between #1, #100 or any other seat equally likely. Thus, by symmetry, #1 or #100, any one will be taken first - with equal probability. Hence last person ends up at his seat with probability 0.5