Performance Class 3?
I didn’t expect to read some of the comments made on this thread on this forum. I kind of hoped we were better than that...but then mankind never fails to disappoint me. I would like to think that they wouldn’t have been said if HKG was still a British Crown Colony (STIC!).
I thought TREX450 got close to asking an interesting question; with the external load bucket jettisoned surely the aircraft could have flown away on one engine. I am not inferring an error on the crew's part, perhaps there were additional problems that we are not aware of that made a ditching the best course of action.
A one-engine-inoperative recovery to the GFS base would have saved the GFS a massive recovery and repair expense and not necessarily have increased the risk, as a ditching and evacuation has its own set of risks.