The Captain on this flight was the only "upgrade" they had.
But!!!
For all of the time he was an FO he had been flying with the Captain and owners.
He might have very well thought it was normal to ignore RVR's and minimums.
The FO will have been line trained by the Captain and owners though as well.
What input the AOC holder had into this training both FO and upgrade I can only imagine. Which is personally where I think the family should focus on. The crew performance on the day won't do thier cause any good what so ever.
O and 99% of pax don't give a toss what the situation is in operating an aircraft. All they care about is that one ticket seller is offering 56 quid and the other one 70 quid.
Try and tell someone not in the industry that a BA ticket although 30 quid more expensive than a going by a LOCO is better value because of interlining and baggage resolution and mutiple hop ticketing V trip ticketing and they will always go for the loco option.
Then of course moan like hell when thier multiple hop falls over and they are stuck with no hotel and a heap of ticket changes to be payed for. If they had payed the 30 quid extra they would have been sent of to a hotel with a 20 quid meal voucher and someone would have dealt with the rest of the changes.