Well, looks to me your Flight Ops department just looked for a way out in the legislation to bring the vehicle home, which is allowed in some cases. In many cases, it is part of their work. Some have to fly them home "ferry". In other cases, some just don't want to spend the company's money sending a team to solve it. Sad, but true. The first engineer, however is just doing things by the book. Shouldn't it always be like that?
Have to agree with "keepitup".
What's wrong with an avionics guy planting "helicoils" or rivets, isn't it part of their basic training? Seen that, been there... Yet, that doesn't make him a B1...
(Hope I understood all correctly)