Question about Addis to Gambella Flight
 

I'm hoping to call the help of any pilots here familiar with the regular Ethiopian Airlines flight from Addis Ababa to Gambella. I'm working on an article that mentions the flight and has this line: "The city of Addis Ababa stands at an altitude of about 8,000 feet, so most of our flight was spent descending."

Could that be true either in terms of flight time or distance covered? The flight is about 300 miles, the aircraft is a Bombardier Dash 8, and Gambella is at 1,700 feet. What's the approximate breakdown of climb, cruise, and descent for this flight?

If you write that in your article, it would be wildly inaccurate.

1. Cruising altitude for a 300 mile flight on this aircraft would be around 21,000 feet.

2. Addis Ababa is at 7,760 above Mean Sea Level so the aircraft would merely attain cruise altitude more quickly than normal.

Climb would take about 15 minutes or so. Cruise about 55 minutes. Descent about 15 minutes give or take.

You would know this if you actually took the flight. Are you trying to mislead people into thinking you went on this flight? This doesn't strike me as journalism. Perhaps, if you choose to write a travel article that indicates you were on a particular flight, you might want to actually go there.

I don't think he mentioned anywhere that he took the flight or that he is trying to indicate such a thing.

"most of our flight was spent descending"

When I fly between CPT (0 feet) and JNB (5560 feet) I haven't noticed that 'most of the flight' is spent descending or climbing, depending on the direction. Maybe I should pay more attention.

Hi, I flew this route (as a passenger) in both directions last year, what exactly do you need to know?