Thanks, I'd forgotten the numbers. They aren't quite as bad as you say. The Ethiopian report shows their radar elevation around 14k feet before the descent, s

Thanks, I'd forgotten the numbers. They aren't quite as bad as you say. The Ethiopian report shows their radar elevation around 14k feet before the descent, so it seems they made it to around 7k feet AGL for a few minutes. Not enough to be able to give up 8k feet during a recovery, I agree.