Good evening from Edmonton International Airport!
My name is Alex, and welcome back to the channel.
In today’s trip report, which was filmed back in November 2019, I’m flying with Central
Mountain Air on a short regional flight down to Calgary, on board their Dornier 328!
Central Mountain Air, or CMA for short, is a western Canadian airline that flies mostly
within British Columbia, but they also have a few routes here in Alberta.
In Edmonton, Central Mountain Air’s check-in area is in the older part of the terminal,
and only opens two hours before a departing flight.
Today’s flight ended up being delayed by about half an hour due to some bad weather
in northern Alberta, so I had some extra time to take a look around.
At CMA’s desk, they have some free bag tags, their in-flight magazine, and a handy printed
flight schedule from Edmonton.
I flew here earlier that day from Calgary on the now-retired Air Canada Express Dash 8-100.
After spending a couple hours here with my friend Robin from Vuelogs, it was back to
Calgary on the evening flight.
Flights between Edmonton and Calgary rarely take longer than 30 minutes.
The two airports are only 250 kilometres apart, or 2.5 hours by car, so it is more practical
to drive most of the time.
However, this is an aviation channel, so obviously, I’m gonna go with the more exciting option!
Now, if you recall from last year, I’ve already flown with Central Mountain Air, doing
the opposite of this flight today.
I made another trip report on that with a much worse microphone,
but people really seemed to like it.
The Dornier is a relatively unique aircraft type here in Canada, and CMA is actually the
only scheduled operator of the type in the entire country.
I had a great time with Central Mountain Air on that trip though, and the timing of this
flight worked out nicely, so booking with them again was a no-brainer.
Our aircraft for today is another one of Central Mountain Air’s Dornier 328s, a 21-year-old
example registered as C-FDYN, painted in this striking arctic camouflage livery.
This aircraft was delivered to Russian carrier Primair in 1998, then picked up by German
operator Bonair Business Charter in 2003.
It made its way to Canada in 2005, and has flown with Central Mountain Air ever since.
One perk of flying with Central Mountain Air, for the aviation enthusiasts at least, are
the ground boarding gates they use.
Gate 7 here in Edmonton was built exactly for that purpose.
Seeing as today’s aircraft is another Dornier, I wasn’t expecting this flight to be much different.
I chose a different seat this time for a view of the engines, but I assumed this would be
a fairly normal trip back home.
Well, as it turns out, that video from last year would be a big part of today’s flight.
Right as I got to the door, I was greeted by our very friendly cabin crew member, which
just happened to be working my other Dornier flight, and they actually remembered me!
Keep in mind that the previous flight was over 6 months ago at the time of filming this!
Granted, tall guy with multiple cameras is slightly more memorable than your average
passenger, but y’know what, it felt kinda nice!
That’s not something that’s ever happened to me before on a larger airline,
and it really made me feel welcome.
CMA offers free seat selection at check-in, so if you check in early enough, you can get
an extra legroom seat for no additional cost.
For this flight, I picked seat 1F, the bulkhead exit row at the very front of the aircraft.
There’s a bit less stretching room than the other exit row in the back, but there’s
plenty of knee space, and an excellent engine view!
Fortunately, this flight was much more full than my other one, but I still lucked out
with nobody beside me.
The reflections in the window were not exactly forgiving on the taxi out, so I’ll go over
the rest once we’re in the air.
For now, here’s our departure from Edmonton, taking off from runway 02.
There wasn’t much of a view out the window on this cloudy evening, so I ended up chatting
with our crew member for most of the ascent.
It turns out they had seen the video from the other flight, after it made its way to
them through a few people at the airline.
Apparently, they all really enjoyed it!
Now that’s something I had not expected to come from that, and given all the aviation
content out there these days, it feels like quite an honour, to me at least!
The Dornier 328 seats 30 passengers in a 1-2 configuration.
In the bulkhead seats, the seatbelts interestingly come with a shoulder strap.
That’s not something I’ve seen on a regional airliner before!
As you’d expect, the tray table can also be found in the armrest, and folds out.
Like I said earlier, flights between Calgary and Edmonton are quite short, which makes
Central Mountain Air’s generous snack offerings stand out!
On this flight, I had a can of Pepsi, some pretzels, and some Oreos.
In the seatback pocket, you’ll find a safety card,
… an air sickness bag,
… and Central Mountain Air’s inflight magazine.
Between Edmonton and Calgary, you really don’t spend very long at cruising altitude, so we
began our descent not long afterwards.
However, you might’ve noticed in an earlier shot, but the Dornier has this little window
in the middle of the flight deck door.
Why, I’m not sure, but with permission from our crew member, filming the view through
there is basically like sitting in the jumpseat!
Here’s our arrival into Calgary, from probably the coolest angle I’ve ever gotten on a
flight here, landing on runway 17R.
Once again, this was a wonderful flight with Central Mountain Air!
From the check-in desk to the gate, CMA’s staff were all extremely friendly, not to
mention the absolutely fantastic crew on board - they really made the flight exceptional!
I really like flying on the Dornier 328, it’s a smooth, comfortable ride, and the fact that
it’s so rare in Canada is a nice bonus!
I’m also super glad I was able to take advantage of that front-facing view - it’s an interesting
quirk of the Dornier, and it wouldn’t have happened had I not been sitting where I was!
Just to be clear though, this was not a sponsored video, I did pay for my own airfare, I just
really enjoyed my first time flying with CMA, and I enjoyed the second time even more!
I think what stood out the most though was that personal touch, and it was a really nice
reminder of why I make these videos in the first place, to share my flights and travels
with like-minded people.
It’s something I don’t say often enough,
but I’m honestly humbled by all of you who continue to watch these videos,
especially those of you who work in the industry that I’m so passionate about.
Hearing that my videos get shared around by crews and within airlines really means a lot,
and being told in person that that one last year
had such a positive impact on a lot of people is really special.
So, genuinely, thank you for watching.
Leave a like if you enjoyed, subscribe if you’re new,
and I will see you next week.