im
ho its a poor decision to go back on a decision to divert. Once you've made a decision and committed, carry it through. It's tempting, I know, but. As it happens the result was completely benign but what if...what if...?
That's what I was always taught. Many years ago, I was on a precision approach in minimum conditions and didn't see the RW at minima; as I started the go-around to my alternate, the other crew member said he could see the RW. It was very probable that I could easily have got in on a subsequent approach, but that would have meant landing below briefed minimum diversion fuel. It didn't help that the only available aerodrome was quite distant and that the aircraft configuration was such that an extra fuel burn penalty had raised the minimum fuel requirement. Of course you can't win - the diversion was no problem but I was hauled over the coals when I got back.....because others had landed successfully.
But in this Budapest case, things were probably rather different. For example, it might have been a wise move to have understated the
actual spare fuel in the first place? But once the offer of a priority approach to a clear runway with no traffic ahead in CAVOK conditions was given, a quick recalc by an experienced crew might have identified that they could still make a visual approach and land with minimum legal diversion fuel, especially given that they probably hadn't used any contingency at that point.
It would be interesting to know whether they were still south of Budapest when climbing through FL110. They also had the weather and runway directions in their favour; to be honest, to me it sounds like a pretty slick decision from a quick thinking crew.