Contour map of the CH₃CN abundance (with respect to H₂) across the Orion KL region, derived from beam-averaged methyl cyanide column densities obtained from simultaneous LVG model fits to multiple K-ladder transitions (see Sect. 5 for details). Contours are plotted from 2 × 10^-9 (white) to 6 × 10^-9 (black) at 0.5 × 10^-9 intervals. The locations of the hot core, compact ridge, radio continuum sources, and the hot zone are indicated as in previous figures.