P.P.
I haven't read the report, but is it possible that the captain, having determined that they had taken gear damage from the strike, used an old jedi trick that we used to call airmanship, and put the dunlops back down before they uplocked?
You only deal with such possibilites one you have completed the OEI profile and have sufficient altitude and speed to consider returning to land. Perhaps they need to dump fuel first. (?)