IStock Photo 9002379 © johnandersonphoto

This week, the 6th and final season of LOST premieres on ABC. In case you have been stranded on an island yourself and missed the past 5 seasons, here’s a quick update.

The producers of LOST hold their cards notoriously close to the chest; even some cast members are apparently unaware of how the show will end. (See NPR's good summary of questions and expectations surrounding this season, entitled “ 'Lost' Producers Reveal Absolutely Nothing To Eagerly Panting TV Critics.”) The situation brings to mind other top-secret wrap-ups, like the end of 24’s first season, the final episodes of both The Sopranos and Sex in the City, or Darth Vader’s now-famous line in The Empire Strikes Back, which, until the movie premiered, was known by only 4 people.

Since virtually no information exists about LOST’s final season, here are some odds pertaining to the show itself, presented in honor of the final season.

In the pilot episode, Oceanic Flight 815 crashes on a mysterious island. The odds an airplane passenger will be involved in a plane crash in a year are 1 in 10,790,000.

Flight 815 is intended to be a Boeing model 777; several unlucky characters are ticketed for middle seats (Boone, Hugo, Jack, Bernard, Kate). The odds a seat on a Boeing 777 is a middle seat are 1 in 3.55.

In a later season, several characters must crash on the island again, so... The odds an adult is afraid of flying are 1 in 5.56.

Many characters see—or even die and reappear as—what may be ghosts. The odds an adult believes in ghosts are 1 in 2.94.

At least one character seems to have come back from death. The odds an adult believes in reincarnation are 1 in 5.

The show itself is filmed in Oahu, Hawaii, where many of the current cast members reside. The odds a person lives in Hawaii are 1 in 236.

A mysterious, smoke-like monster makes brief appearances on the island, occasionally killing a character. The odds a person will die from exposure to smoke or fire in a year are 1 in 96,300.

One character is (un)lucky enough to win a lottery jackpot using a mysterious, recurring set of numbers. “The numbers,” as they are called, are 4, 8, 15, 16, 23, and 42. Evidently, these have been very popular lottery-number picks ever since. (Imagine if they ever won. For a similar circumstance, see this story from 2005, in which a common fortune cookie combo produced 121 lotto winners.) The odds a Powerball entry, consisting of LOST’s “numbers” in order and 42 as the Powerball, will win the jackpot are one in 195,249,054, or roughly 1 in 195,200,000.

And the odds that, as so many have posited, the show's characters are really dead and in purgatory? According to the producers, the characters are absolutely not stranded in some Dantean holding area, making those odds 0.