From what I understand, at the time AWK ops, and for that matter Charter, were not required to carry an alternate for Norfolk! WX/Notams notwithstanding of course. Hello CASA, was anyone home! Now from a command point of view, I'd be extremely cautious about embarking on such a flight without at least another option up my sleeve. I'm assuming of course that the captain had calculated his relevant PNRs/CPs.
That brings us to the question, at what point did the crew learn the Wx at norfolk required an alternate, and was this information passed to them in time to take a different course of action?