You’re about to see a lot more of Ethiopian Airlines in Dublin!
Ethiopian will be launching flights to Los Angeles
In June 2015, Ethiopian Airlines will begin flying between Addis Ababa and Los Angeles… via Dublin. The route will be operated by a 787, and is especially interesting since Ethiopian will have pick-up rights in Dublin. So if you wanted to, you could fly Ethiopian exclusively between Los Angeles and Dublin.
The schedule on that flight is quite interesting as well, as they’re operating one of the earliest westbound transatlantic flights, and one of the latest eastbound transatlantic flights, as follows:
ET504 Addis Ababa to Dublin departing 10:30PM arriving 5:00AM (+1 day)
ET504 Dublin to Los Angeles departing 6:15AM arriving 8:30AMET505 Los Angeles to Dublin departing 11:30PM arriving 6:30PM (+1 day)
ET505 Dublin to Addis Ababa departing 7:30PM arriving 6:00AM (+1 day)
Ethiopian will start refueling in Dublin
The above is old news, though. Here’s the new news, which I find especially interesting. Ethiopian presently serves two destinations in North America — Toronto and Washington. The eastbound flights to Addis Ababa are nonstop, while the westbound flights from Addis Ababa both have a fuel stop in Rome.
Ethiopian doesn’t actually have pick-up rights in Rome, but instead it’s just a refueling stop, with all passengers staying on the plane.
Why? Because Addis Ababa is at an extremely high altitude (~7,600 feet), so there’s no way to fly to the US nonstop from there.
As of May 10, 2015, Ethiopian will be changing their refueling point from Rome to Dublin, though. In other words, the westbound flights from Addis Ababa to Toronto and Washington will route via Dublin instead of Rome.
Ethiopian still won’t have pick-up rights, so this is just a technicality, really.
What’s interesting is how closely the schedules line up on all three flights:
ET500 Addis Ababa to Dublin departing 10:30PM arriving 5:00AM (+1 day)
ET500 Dublin to Washington departing 6:15AM arriving 8:30AMET502 Addis Ababa to Dublin departing 10:40PM arriving 5:10AM (+1 day)
ET502 Dublin to Toronto departing 6:25AM arriving 8:20AMET504 Addis Ababa to Dublin departing 10:30PM arriving 5:00AM (+1 day)
ET504 Dublin to Los Angeles departing 6:15AM arriving 8:30AM
Some days you can expect to see three Ethiopian widebodies on the ground in Dublin in the wee hours of the morning.
Bottom line
From a passenger’s perspective this really doesn’t change anything, given that Ethiopian won’t be using the US pre-clearance facility in Dublin. This change still makes a lot of sense for them, though. Ultimately it’s much more efficient to service three aircraft than one in terms of staffing, hotel costs, etc., and I’d be willing to bet Dublin Airport gave them a good deal.
While Dublin is slightly more out of the way than Rome, the difference is negligible, and it’s slightly closer to being at the halfway point of the journey, which is more fuel efficient.
I’m curious to see how the fifth freedom flight between Dublin and Los Angeles performs. It would be really interesting if long term Ethiopian’s flights out of Washington and Toronto stopped in both directions and they had pick-up rights.
In the meantime, don’t be concerned that you landed on the wrong continent if you find yourself at Dublin Airport at 6AM and see three Ethiopian planes.
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