Meekal:
So, since he did hit the hills, he must have been executing the circle-to-land DME arc for 12. I have done that at least 20 times from the front and the back of the bus.
Back course approaches have a way of getting cancelled as localizer performance degrades over time (absent aggressive maintenance/replacements). As to the 12 DME ARC that would seem to arc west of the crash site.