Originally Posted by
funfly
It would be a terrible decision to make within a fraction of a second if you had to decide whether to impact a road/trees or take the risk of stalling while trying to 'lift' over.
The ground was basically flat for a great distance in every direction. There was no need to make any decision to clear the road/trees. That was a very minor obstacle to a 737-800.
What happened here is the aircraft stalled while on approach for some unknown reason. The recovery was either incorrect or incomplete.
The pilots didn't make a decision to avoid the trees. They were just along for the ride at that point.